Dissonant Plane

Carpet Floor has released 4 pressed CD (not CDRs) of crisply recorded free rock instrumentals.  Garry Davis (editor of Arcane Candy magazine) and Matt Crane (former Seattle resident) play guitar and drums respectively, but occasionally branch out on other instruments.  One of the variations are Garry’s steel rod and steel spring guitar which add said objects to the strings on the neck.  The music was all recorded over a period of several years and this is obviously a distillation of the best moments onto 4 CDs.  The works are all instrumental and have a kind of Southern California desert soundtrack vibe to them  It reminds me a little of early Sonic Youth or Savage Republic.  I say this not only for the grooves they freely move through, but also the variety to explore more abstract soundscapes once in a while.  They themselves describe the music as “heavy psychedelic rock and abstract improvisation with plenty of free-jazz-influenced drumming and fuzz guitar destruction.”  “Blow Out” does in fact have some free jazz moments with guest saxophone player Adam Diller on 5 tracks, but overall the music leans more heavily to the rock side and is easily accessible.  It seems like great music for a road trip.  Packaged simply in paper sleeves, the discs only sell for $7.00, inviting you to explore their wares.  That’s all the same price as the little 64-page book of full color photographs by Garry Davis called “Point and Shoot”.  With basically no text except the index at the back, this is a pocket sized collection of concert shots taken between 1999 and 2008.  It is a rock photo book for the weirdo set with Ya Ho Wa 13, Keiji Haino + Fushitsusha, James Cecil Davis, Tony Conrad, Stereolab, Don Bolles, James Chance and the Contortions, Rebekah Raff + Just Strings, Val Bertoia, Bardo Pond, Danielson Famile, Jackie-O Motherfucker, Stefano Scodanibbio and Terry Riley, Rod Poole, Sir Richard Bishop, The Wives, Dos, Thurston Moore + White Out, Slint, Carpet Floor, Custom Floor, Lavender Diamond, Pole, Merzbow, Brad Laner, Matt Crane and Tom Swafford, Sonic Youth, Partch, Lance Mountain, White Magic, The Brothers Unconnected and 88 Broadrum.  I think Garry said he made only 50 copies of this. - Eric

• Akitsa - Sang Nordique
• Amesoeurs - s/t
• Kylesa - Static Tensions LP
• Ludicra - Fex Urbis, Lex Orbis CD & LP
• MoHa! - One Way Ticket to Candyland  LP
• V:28 all three of their full lengths
• Velnias - Sovereign Nocturnal
• Waldteufel - Sanguis
• Waldteufel - Rauhnacht
• Fearthainne - s/t
• Althes - Althea
• All three Psyopus full lengths
• Sunn0))) - Monoliths and Dimensions
• Deathspell Omega - Fas
• Arum - Prelude to the Cataclysm
• Gorgoroth - Uder the Sign of Hell
• Horna / Behexen - split
• Infernum - Taur-Nu-Fuin
• Krisiun - Assassination
• Macabre - Murder Metal
• Mayhem / Emperor - split
• Nortt - Galgenfrist
• Nortt - Graven
• Nortt - Ligfaerd
• Sigh - Hangman’s Hymn
• Wyrd - Vartimmen Part 2
• Wyrd / Häive / Kehrä - split
• Xasthur - s/t

Zaïmph is the awesome solo noise project of Marcia Bassett.  Heavy mysterious noise drones.  She is half of Hototogisu (with Matthew Bower), one-third of GHQ one-quarter of Double Leopards, half of Zaika (with Tom Carter) and was in Siltbreeze band un.  Marcia’s Zaimph has released some fantastic vinyl, CDs and tapes on her own Heavy Blossom label as well as great labels like No Fun, Utech, Arbor, Volcanic Tongue, and Heavy Tapes.

Going through some recent emails about shows that happened in town while I was in Indonesia, I discovered Sokai Stilhed.  That’s the childhood nickname of Heather Cullen and the moniker she performs and records under.  Her songs are delicate and soulful with a wonderful mysterious lo-fi production that layers her voice with acoustic instruments and sounds.  So I dropped her a line and asked if she would like to bring some of her discs here to sell.  She came by today and they look even cooler in person than on the web.  These lovely sounds are wrapped in envelopes with handmade covers.  The first untitled disc has a section of an old carpet invoice and a little envelope pasted to the cover.  Inside the little envelope is a little folded sheet of paper with the titles typewritten out.  On top of this, the bigger envelope which makes up the sleeve has a button and thread to tie closed the opening.  It is a little personal message reaffirming the private nature of the music inside.  The second disc is similarly wrapped, except that both envelopes are closed with sealing wax embossed with a fish design (this one can be found in the case as we don’t want to break the seals).  They are both really lovely items and we only sell them for $7.00.  Check out the above link for some sounds on her myspace page.  I also found an excellent article that Dave Segal wrote about her in The Stranger.  As you can read, she’s just played a number of gigs, but has a few more coming up including a night at The Josephine on July 16th with Hemmingway and The Shining Ones, which should be an interesting contrast. - Eric

FREE IN STORE PERFORMANCE

SIMON WICKHAM-SMITH

JONATHAN WAY

THURSDAY, MAY 28th, 2009

7:00 PM

Simon Wickham-Smith is an English musician who has been pumping out great records for a good two decades now.  Ranging from noisy and droney to more delicate acoustic improvisations, his work has covered a wide range.  Mostly in collaboration with Richard Youngs, Simon has released a large number of classic CDs and LPs through labels such as No Fans, VHF, Majora, Forced Exposure, Fourth Dimension, Ignivomous, PseudoArcana, Celebrate Psi Phenomenon, Insignificant and Pogus.  They still record together, however less frequently now and more of Simon’s recent recordings have been solos.  On top of all this, Simon was a Buddhist monk in the Karma Kagyü tradition of Tibetan Buddhism and has lately been busy with translation Mongolian literature into English.  You can find out a lot more about him here:

http://www.wickhamsmith.net/

http://www.myspace.com/simonwickhamsmith

From what I gather, Simon will be providing a nice drone for his in store performance at Dissonant Plane.

Also playing a short set this night will be Jonathan Way.  Like Simon, Jonathan is also a translator of Asian texts as well as a sound artist.  So it should come as no surprise that the two became friends when Simon relocated to Seattle.  Jonathan is probably best known for playing with the Seattle Phonographers Union.  Nonetheless, he has also had a CDR released by Greg Davis’ Autumn Records and a track on the “phonography.org 7″ compilation.  For this solo performance he will be mixing recordings of snow, brush and trees and combining them with the sounds of small improvisations.

Jesse Paul Miller and his wife Linda Peschong packed up and traveled through Asia for six months in 2008.  I reckon about two months of that was in Indonesia on the islands of Bali, Java and Lombok.  While there Jesse made numerous recordings of music and the sounds of life which he has started publishing on limited edition CDRs.  “Asia Archive 2008” is concerned solely with the Muslim call to prayer heard throughout Indonesia.  Most of the disc was recorded in Solo (Surakarta), an old royal city in central Java.  The call to prayer comes from all directions in Javanese cities as mosques are everywhere.  Not only that, they seem to all run on a slightly different clock as the calls from each mosque start at different times.  This means that five times a day there is a beautiful overlap of loudspeakers, often broadcasting quite distorted, mixing with the sounds of the town, in this case the sleepy city of Solo.  It is constantly variable and Jesse even captured the sound of the tape being reversed one day, as well as several nice musical performances which appear toward the end of this 77 minute disc.  A small fragment of call to prayer (ironic recorded at the Buddhist momument Borobudur) is also included on “Jalan Jalan - Street Atmospheres and Music in the Heart of Java“.  There are 16 tracks on this disc and they cover a wide range of material including street musicians, markets, food courts, rain and radio.  A more varied disc, this should definitely appeal to fans of the Sublime Frequencies label.  Compiled in a similar manner is “Bali - Converging Orchestras of Life and Rebirth on the Island of the Gods“.  While obviously shifting its focus to another location, it also reveals how different culture is on these two neighboring islands (they are separated by a mile wide strait).  The Bali disc is full of ceremonial gamelan including much from a mass ceremation of 54 bodies in Ubud.  Also added to the mix are cock fighting, beach drumming, children, birds, night sounds, kecak and of course more gamelan - all filled with the wonderful energy of Bali.  The whole disc is fantastic, but is easily worth it alone for the Gamelan Beleganjur recording (marching gamelan).  Rounding out our Jesse Paul Miller selection is “Constellation” which collects recordings made closer to home in Colorado, Hawaii and Washington States.  A 53 minute collage of monsoon rain, frogs, highway overpass, hummingbirds and children, ice breaking in a tiny bay, oysters, bamboo forest, and “all that accompanies”.  This disc is subdued, a relaxed exploration of sound.  All four are exceptional and frequently enjoyed at home.  Also, they are very limited self published released CDRs in editions of only 20 to 40 hand numbered copies.  Given that Jesse also sells these discs to shops in Japan, they probably won’t be around too long.

Thank you Chad for the wonderful in store performance last night.  We got most of it on video (stupid camera) and Jim Evans recorded it to something like 6 tape deck placed around the room.  Chad made a new C12 release for the store last night which is Volume V of “Songs for Melting Lovers”.  We are already sold out, but hopefully will get more.  I think he made less copies than the number of people that showed up last night, so I’m not sure about that.

Latest batch of used goodies:

• 3/4 Had Been Eliminated  “A Year of the Aural Gauge Operation”  CD  (Häpna)  $10  - gentle filmic rock with nice little sounds
• Badalamenti, Angelo  “Soundtrack from Twin Peaks”  CD  (Warner Bros.)  $8  - Eric stopped watching TV when this went off the air
• Balmorhea  “Like Water in a Dream of Thaw”  CD  $7  - soft instrumental post rock with acoustic instruments
• Balmorhea  “Tour EP”  CDR EP  $3  - CDR EP, instrumental post rock, ltd. 175
• Circle  “Sunrise”  CD  (No Quarter)  $10  - like a psychedelic Motorhead
• Dif Juz  “Extractions”  CD  (4AD)  $8  - jazzy instrumental rock produced by Robin Guthrie
• Eckhart, Eric  “Lost and Found”  CD  $2  - slickly produced folk songs & indie rock
• Electronicat  “21st Century Toy”  CD  (Disko B)  $7  - ‘electric-glam-rock n roll’; promo w/no tray
• Galbraith, Alastair  “Cry”  CD  (Emperor Jones Records)  $10  - guitar, drones, loops, vocals in a dreamy combination
• Galbraith, Alastair / De Gennaro, Matt  “From the Dark (South Island)”  CD  (Xeric)  $9  - awesome acoustic long string drones
• Grouper  “Wide”  LP  (Weird Forest)  $8  - fragile lo-fi echos, clear & black vinyl mix, only 500 made
• House of Cosy Cushions  “Animal Dream”  CD  (Seadog Records)  $7
• Jeck, Philip  “Surf”  CD  (Touch)  $9  - subtle textures created from vinyl and loops
• Kemialliset Ystävät CD  (Fonal)  $10  - wild freak folk from Finland
• Mountain High  “Co-Op Shmo-Op”  7″  (Hot Dog City Record Co.)  $2  - garage / indie rock
• My Cat Is An Alien / Roden, Steve  “Cosmic Debris Volume II”  CD  (A Silent Place)  $10  - split of quiet sound, reissue of extremely ltd art LP
• No Land’s Band  “Percolating Joys”  CDR  (Ero)  $2  - CDR, ambient noise electronics
• Oracle  “Doomed to Reign Volume Two”  CDR  (Scatalogical Liberation Front)  $5  - CDR, ltd. 100, Seattle black metal
• Oval  “Ovalprocess”  CD  (Thrill Jockey)  $7  - glitchy ambient electronica
• Pink Floyd  “More”  CD  (Capitol)  $8  - originally releaed in 1969
• Popol Vuh  “In Den Gärten Pharaos”  CD  (SPV)  $8  - essential ‘71 album of Moog ambiance w/bonus tracks
• Pretty Things, The  “S.F. Sorrow”  CD  (Edsel Records)  $10  - very psychedelic pop from 1967
• Various  “KVRX Local Live, Vol. 13″  CD  $2  - w/Donkeys, Half Japanese, Akron/Family, Balmorhea
• Weirdlords  “The Book of Weird Vol. 1″  CDR  (Council of Serpentry Music)  $2  - experimental & lo-fi rock from Seattle
• Weirdlords  “Zizlore’s Mansion”  CD EP  (Council of Serpentry Music)  $2  - heavy rock from Seattle; 26 minutes
• Whitman, Keith Fullerton  “Playthroughs”  CD  (Kranky)  $8  - pretty drones
• Zorn, John  “Cartoon S&M”  2 x CD  (Tzadik)  $12

Late next Thursday night is a screening the black metal documentary “Until the Light Takes Us“.  It’s only playing Thursday the 28th and Saturday the 30 at 11:30 PM and the directors will be there.  The film features Gylve “Fenriz” Nagell, Varg “Count Grishnackh” Vikernes, Jan Axel “Hellhammer” Blomberg, Kjetil “Frost” Haraldstad, Olve “Abbath” Eikemo, Harald “Demonaz” Nævdal, Harmony Korine, Bjarne Melgaard, Kristoffer “Garm” Rygg, and Bård “Faust” Eithun.  Plus it has music by Darkthrone, Mayhem, Burzum, Ulver, Thorns, Gorgoroth, Enslaved, Boards of Canada, Black Dice, Sunn 0))), Múm and Lesser.  Don’t miss your chance to see it on the big screen!  Details about these screenings can be found here:
http://www.nwfilmforum.org/live/page/calendar/892
and details about the movie are here:
http://www.blackmetalmovie.com/

Dug a few interesting goodies out of the Anomalous Records archives (unsold new stock from mail order):

• Nurse With Wound  ”Automating Volume One”  CD  (United Dairies)  $30  - long out of print World Serpent edition
• Nurse With Wound  ”Automating Volume Two”  CD  (United Dairies)  $30  - long out of print World Serpent edition
• Nurse With Wound  ”Funeral Music For Perez Prado”  CD  (United Dairies)  $30  - long out of print World Serpent edition
• Nurse With Wound  ”Large Ladies With Cake In The Oven”  CD  (United Dairies)  $30  - long out of print World Serpent edition
• Nurse With Wound  ”Live at Bar Maldoror”  CD  (United Dairies)  $30  - long out of print World Serpent edition
• Nurse With Wound  ”Rat Tapes One”  CD  (United Dairies)  $18  - 18 tracks of unreleased outtakes, ltd. 1000
• Nzetwork Down  ”1/1996/1997″  CD  (Hasikamke)  $14  - underrated Japanse noise collages w/field recordings
• Off Ramp  ”Off Chance”  CD  (Ramp Records)  $10  - wild electronics from highly treated acoustic instruments
• One Ensemble of Daniel Padden CD  (Catsup Plate Records)  $11  - solo from Volcano The Bear member, ltd. 500
• Orange Head  ”Right Into the Sun”  CDR  (Cha-Bashira)  $15  - CDR, crazy vinyl abuse from Japan
• Organum  ”Ikon”  CD EP  (Robot Records / Siren Records)  $11  - only 16 min, but absolutely beautiful and recommended
• Organum & The New Blockaders  ”Pulp”  CD  (Robot Records)  $13  - early & essential U.K. noise from 1984
• Organum & The New Blockaders  ”Salute”  CD  (Robot Records)  $12  - intense noise collab from 1984; reissue of very rare tape
• Orhanyoj  ”1. Quartett”  CDR  (IRRAH-Verlag)  $17  - CDR, atonal horn quartet informed by modern classical
• Orhanyoj  ”2. Quartett”  CDR  (IRRAH-Verlag)  $15  - CDR, atonal horn quartet informed by modern classical
• O’Rourke, Jim  ”I’m Happy, and I’m Singing and a 1,2,3,4″  CD  (Mego)  $12  - loopy sound collages
• O’Rourke, Jim & Prime,Michael & Prevost, Eddie  ”Alpha Lemur Echo Two”  CD  (Mycophile Records)  $13  - members of Sonic Youth, Morphogenesis & AMM
• Osaka Bondage  ”Volume 2″  CD  (Shambala Records)  $15  - improvised experimental illbient textures
• Ostrowski, Matthew  ”Vertebra”  CD  (Pogus Productions)  $11  - wild sound collages
• Otomo Yoshihide & Voice Crack  ”Bits, Bots and Signs”  CD  (Erstwhile Records)  $12  - wonderful spacious quiet noise electronics
• Outer Sound Project, The CD  (Ecstatic Peace)  $12  - crazy lo-fi acoustic free for all & street recordings
• O Yuki Conjugate  ”Undercurrents (In Dark Water)”  CD  (Staalplaat)  $12  - flowing ambient with tribal rhythms; now out of print
• Prevost, Eddie / Organum  ”Flayed / Crux”  CD  (Matchless Recordings)  $17  - reissue of long out of print drone LP from 1987