Dissonant Plane

• Acid Mothers Temple & The Melting Paraisio U.F.O.  ”Absolutely Freak Out (Zap Your Mind!)”  2 x LP  (Resonant / Static Caravan)  USED  $35  - OOP 2001 release, ltd 1000, 1 LP black, 1 LP purple
• Artificial Memory Trace  ”Vol. 13: Erozion”  LP  (E.R.S. Records)  USED  $8  - organic drones & loops, 3 long tracks & 18 lock grooves
• deRidder, Willem + Crawl Unit  ”Voice & Sound”  7″  (Povertech Industries)  USED  $4  - Dutch Fluxus & Hafler Trio guy telling tall tales,  ltd 300
• Hands To  ”Cipher”  7″  (Povertech Industries)  USED  $4  - Jeph Jerman’s lo-fi noise project, ltd 300
• [multer]  ”Neskt”  10″  (Genesungswerk)  USED  $4  - minimal & experimental beats from Germany, ltd 500
• NON  ”Solitude”  7″  (Mute Records)  USED  $8  - features 8 lock grooves + extra center hole, ltd 700
• Pan Sonic  ”B”  12″ EP  (Mute Records)  USED  $4  - Finnish masters of heavy minimal analog beats
• Project W  ”Snake Legs”  7″  (Apraxia)  USED  $2  - improv jazz w/Shoup, ltd 500, red vinyl, missing cover
• Ransone, Key  /  Leonard, Cheryl E.  ”Apraxia Composer Series Vol. 1″  7″  (Apraxia)  USED  $2  - Small Cruel Party guy & ex-member of Caroliner
• Shifts  ”Eight Line”  LP  (E.R.S. Records)  USED  $10  - cool drones from Frans (Beequeen, Freiband), ltd 200
• snd  ”MakeSND Cassette”  2 x LP  (Mille Plateaux)  USED  $10  - clicks’n'cuts style from 1999, 2 LPs in single pocket
• Solid Eye  ”It’s a Salon”  7″  (Detector)  USED  $10  - very cool glow in the dark vinyl!  weird LAFMS sounds
• Sound  ”Screaming Zenith”  2 x LP  (Beta-Lactam Ring Records)  $14  - mondo weirdo sounds from Texas, ltd 300
• Spiritualized  ”Pure Phase Tones for D.J.’s”  LP  (Spaceman Records)  USED  $20  - ltd release of phased ambient electronics
• Tzotziles  ”Psalms, Stories and Music”  LP  (Sub Rosa)  USED  $10  - festivals & rituals of a Mayan group recorded ‘75-’85
• Vote Robot  ”RUR”  LP  (Vegas / Catsup Plate)  USED  $20  - Canadian swirling & glitch electronics & loops, long OOP
• Vote Robot  ”Versions”  LP  (Vegas-p)  USED  $30  - remix album w/Climax Golden Twins, ltd 100, very rare

A year is a long time.  So I have probably forgotten a few things.  But here is what comes to mind as my favorite new releases and reissues that came out in 2009:

• AFCGT - AFCGT (Uzu Audio) LP
• Laurie Scott Baker - Gracility (Musicnow) 2xCD
• L. Berner - Blackout Nights (Zen Enthusia) 2xCass
• Sir Richard Bishop - The Freak Of Araby (Drag City) CD
• Crystal Hell Pool - Wind Blows Through Me (Crippled Symmetry Recordings) CDR
• Dropp Ensemble - Safety (and/OAR) CD
• Luc Ferrari - Labyrinthe De Violence / DANCE (Alga Marghen) 12″
• Ibliss - Supernova (Garden Of Delights) CD
• The Inner Space - Agilok & Blubbo (Wah-Wah Records Sound)
• Demian Johnston - Forever (Dead Accents) Cass
• Demian Johnston - Still (Dead Accents) Cass
• Dave Knott - Sweet Little Guitar Ditties (Not On Label) CD
• R Millis - 120 (Etude Records) CD
• Hiroaki Minami - Obscure Tape Music Of Japan Vol.10: Electronic Symphony No. 1 (Edition Omega Point) CD
• People Band - People Band 69/70 (Emanem) 2xCD
• Eliane Radigue - Triptych (Important Records) CD
• Eliane Radigue - Vice Versa, Etc.… (Important Records) 2xCD
• Matt Shoemaker - The Sunken Plethora Consumes All (Mystery Sea) CDR
• Omar Souleyman - Dabke 2020: Folk And Pop Sounds Of Syria (Sublime Frequenices) CD
• Sperm - Shh! Heinäsirkat (De Stijl) LP
• Sun City Girls - Napoleon & Josephine (Sun City Girls Singles Volume 2) (Abduction) CD
• Akio Suzuki - Ki-date (Ichinomiya City Memorial Art Museum of Setsuko Migishi) DVD
• Giancarlo Toniutti - The Early Tapes Period (Vinyl-On-Demand) 3xLP + 10″
• UnicaZürn - Temporal Bends (uZu Music) CD
• Simon Wickham-Smith - A Seventh Persimmon (Tape Drift Records) CDR
• Zaïmph - Serpent’s Bite (Heavy Blossom) CD
• Various - 1970’s Algerian Proto-Rai Underground (Sublime Frequencies) CD

FREE IN STORE PERFORMANCEFRIDAY, OCTOBER 30, 2009
7:00 PM
KAWABATA MAKOTO
?ALOS
AERIAL RAIN

Founder of Acid Mothers Temple Soul Collective, Kawabata Makoto has been recording and touring for 30+ years. His projects and collaborations have brought him all over the globe, working with many prolific artists along the way such as Keiji Haino, Mani Neumeier(Guru Guru), Daevid Allen(Gong), Damo Suzuki(Can) and Kinski. From beautiful ambient dreamscapes to full blown psychedelic freakouts by way of sonic experimentation(often in the same song!), Kawabata’s music is as unrestrained as it is inspired.

Where do these sounds come from? Who is sending them out? That is not something for me to know, and neither is there any way that I could find out. I simply believe that they come from the ‘cosmos’.
-Kawabata Makoto

Kawabata Makoto leads prolific psych-rock behemoths Acid Mothers Temple, but on his own he often opts for beatific guitar emanations that suggest a strict regimen of Zen Buddhist meditation rather than AMT’s grandiloquent jamming and sonic holocausts. You could say the man loves his extremes. The INUI series of albums Kawabata’s recorded for VHF Records—as well as I’m in Your Inner Most and Hosanna Mantra—stands as a beautiful, solemn monument to his mellower inclinations, but you should probably bring earplugs, just in case the Japanese ax master gets into one of his ornery moods. Bonus: Dissonant Plane will give you a limited-edition poster to commemorate this event with any Kawabata/Acid Mothers–related purchase or any $20-plus purchase of merchandise.
  - DAVE SEGAL in The Stranger

http://www.acidmothers.com
http://www.myspace.com/kawabatamakoto
http://www.myspace.com/acidmotherstemple

• Aethenor  ”Betimes Black Cloudmasses”  CD  (VHF)  USED  $8  - with Stephen O’Malley of Sunn0))), Khanate, KTL, etc.
• Ahmed, Ilyas  ”Between Two Skies/Towards the Night”  2 x CD  (Digitalis)  USED  $10  - 2 CD set from Portland based troubadour
• Ahmed, Ilyas  ”Vertigo of Dawn, The”  CD  (Time-Lag Records)  USED  $8  - psychedelic folk from Portland
• Anubi  ”Kai Pilnaties Akis Uzmerks Mirtis”  CD  (Danza Ipnotica Records)  USED  $14  - Weird obscure psych based metal from Lithuania (rare)
• ARC  ”Arcturus”  CD  (DiN)  USED  $8.00  - sequencer driven keyboards like Tangerine Dream
• Asva  ”What You Don’t Know is Frontier”  CD  (Southern Records)  USED  $8  - heavy & slow descent w/ amazing treatments
• Banhart, Devendra  ”White Reggae Troll”  12″  (XL Recordings)  USED  $10  - single sided psychedlic 12″ w/reggae & African influence
• Bishop, Sir Richard  ”Freak of Araby, The”  CD  (Drag City)  USED  $8  - Arabic driven rhythms. highest recommendation!
• Chromatics  ”Chrome Rats vs. Basement Ruts”  CD  (GSL)  USED  $4  - Portland based post punk/ synyh pop
• Datashock, Aidan Baker, Leah Buckareff LP  (Hlava / Meudiademorte)  USED  $50  - ltd 93, 1 side only, 2nd side screenprinted
• Deathspell Omega  ”Fas-Ite, Maledicti in Ignem Aeternum”  CD  USED  $8  - Extreme scary French BM
• Deathspell Omega  ”Si Monvmentvm Reqvires, Circvmspice”  CD  USED  $8  - French BM supergroup ritual
• Earth  ”10 1990″  LP  (The Ajna Offensive)  USED  $50  - alt. versions of “Extra-Capsular” track + 16rpm tracks
• Hoor-Paar-Kraat  ”An Anagram Hypnotic”  LP  (Goat Eater Arts)  USED  $6  - drones and deep chords, ltd 281
• Hoor-Paar-Kraat  ”In Eros Veritas”  LP  (Goat Eater Arts / KNVBI Records)  USED  $6  - creaky experimental soundscapes, ltd 300
• Hunter, Jana / Banhart, Devendra LP  (Troubleman Unlimited)  USED  $10  - great split of psych infused folk
• Jodorowsky, Alejandro  ”Santa Sangre”  2 x DVD  (Comstar)  USED  $10  - bizarre circus, murder freakout! incredible stuff
• Joyce, James  ”Ulysses”  book  (Vintage International)  USED  $5  - controversial, influential & for a while, a banned book
• Khanate  ”No Joy (Remix)”  12″  USED  $20  - 45 RPM 12″ with exclusive remix, out of print
• Larsen  ”Musm”  2 x LP  (Enterruption)  USED  $6  - post rock w/bonus screenprinted anti-record
• Mothlite  ”Flax of Reverie, The”  2 x LP  (Southern Records)  USED  $8  - 4 dreamy sides w/member of Sunn 0))) and Guapo
• Muslimgauze  ”Gun Aramaic Part 2″  CD  (Soleilmoon Recordings)  USED  $12  - Arabic infused electronica, ltd. 2000, OOP
• Nokturnal Mortum  ”To the Gates of Blasphemous Fire”  CD  USED  $5  - Ukrainian symphonic folk
• Nokturnal Mortum  ”Twilightfall”  CD  USED  $5  - Ukraine BM ‘95 release
• Om / Current 93  ”Inerrant Rays Of Infallible Sun (Blackship Shrinebuilder)”  10″  (Neurot Recordings)  USED  $15  - split EP, doom vs. apocalypse, green vinyl
• Popol Vuh  ”Hosianna-Mantra”  CD  (SPV)  USED  $8.00  - Dreamy ambient offering from 72 w/ bonus track
• Squarepusher  ”Burningn’n Tree”  2 x LP  (Warp)  USED  $15  - great double LP of electro glitch bass madness
• Squarepusher  ”Feed Me Weird Things”  2 x LP  (Rephlex)  USED  $25  - 1996 debut, glitchy, bass heavy, for fans of Aphex Twin
• Squarepusher  ”Go Plastic”  2 x LP  (Warp)  USED  $20  - Richard D. James discovered him in a club!!!
• Squarepusher  ”Maximum Priest E.P.”  12″  (Warp)  USED  $5  - 1999 release with Autechre & Wagonchrist remixes
• Squarepusher  ”Venus No. 17″  12″  (Warp)  USED  $10  - 2004 EP, glitchy, bass heavy
• Squarepusher / Thomas, Richard  ”Am Carnal, and I Know That You Approve”  12″  (Lo Recordings)  USED  $5  - 1999 collaboration, glitchy, bass heavy
• Stokes, Saul  ”Metacollage”  CDR  (stokes Music)  USED  $10  - Limited CD-R w/ hand signed card. recommended!
• Sunn 0)))  ”CandleWolff ov thee Golden Chalice”  LP  (Anti-Mosh)  USED  $100  - 2004 Peel sessions, same music both sides, out of print
• Sunn 0)))  ”GrimmRobe Demos, The”  2 x LP  (Southern Lord)  USED  $30  - heavy doom, black vinyl edition of 1000
• Teresa 11  ”Smoky Heaven”  CD  (Eibon Records)  USED  $8  - Exotic electronica from Japan w/ acoustics
• Various  ”Down in a Mirror : A Second Tribute to Jandek”  CD  (Summersteps Records)  USED  $6  - feat. Jeff Tweedy, Brother JT, Kawabata Makoto, etc.
• Various  ”Naked in the Afternoon: A Tribute to Jandek”  CD  (Summersteps Records)  USED  $6  - Eclectic mix of artists feat. Bright Eyes, Kid Icarus, etc.

AMBIENT/DRONE:

Deceh LP  (Important Records)  $21  - acoustic/electronic drone, screenprinted insert, ltd 400

Eleh  ”Homage To The Sine Wave”  LP  (Taiga)  $22  - minimal drone electronics, numbered edition of 500

FM3  ”Buddha Machine II - Lime”  Soundbox  (FM3)  $24  - new loops, pitch control, better speaker, lime case

Radigue, Eliane  ”Triptych”  CD  (Important Records)  $14  - awesome archival minimalism from France

Radigue, Eliane  ”Vice Versa, Etc…”  2 x CD  (Important Records)  $16  - awesome archival minimalism from France, 2 discs

CLASSICAL:

Brown, Earle  ”Folio and Four Systems”  CD  (Tzadik)  $15  - early avant-garde & graphic scores, friend of John Cage

Gibson, Jon  ”Criss X Cross”  CD  (Tzadik)  $15  - solo flute & saxophone, worked with La Monte, Riley, etc

Stockhausen, Karlheinz  ”Spiral I & II, Pole, Wach, Japan, Zykus, Tierkries”  2 x CD  (EMI Classics)  $14  - reissue of amazing 2 LP box of experimental pieces

EXPERIMENTAL:

Airway  ”Live at LACE”  LP  (Harbinger Sound)  $25  - 1st vinyl reissue of early (1978) influential wall of noise

Conrad, Tony & Olson, Tovah  ”Let There Be Music”  LP  (Tovinator)  $13  - ltd 200, instantly sold out from the label, one side only

De Martinville, Edouard-Leon Scott  ”Au Clair de la Lune”  7″  (Parlortone)  $8  - 1st experiment in recording sound from 1860!!!

H.N.A.S.  ”Im Schaten der Möhre”  CD  (Streamline)  $14  - finely crafted German weirdness, their best album

Starving Weirdos  ”Father Guru”  CD  (Azul Discografica)  $14  - long trancey tracks

Winderen, Jana  ”Noisiest Guys on the Planet”  C40  (Ash International)  $7  - field recordings of underwater crustaceans, ltd 250

JAZZ/IMPROV:

Supersilent  ”7″  DVD  (Rune Grammofon)  $23  - stellar DVD video of a live concert

ROCK:

Bonzo Dog Doo-Dah Band, The  ”Gorilla”  CD  (EMI)  $12  - humorous English music w/Neil Innes, Vivian Stanshall

Fushitsusha 2 x CD  (P.S.F. Records)  $38  - heavy rock w/Seijiro Murayama, Yasushi Ozawa, 2 CD

Neung Phak  ”Fucking USA”  7”  (Abduction)  $8  - great cover of Korean anti-American rock tune, ltd 300

Sic Alps  ”A Long Way Around to a Shortcut”  2 x LP  (Drag City)  $20  - lo-fi garage noise rock

Six Organs of Admittance / Azul  ”Split”  LP  (P.S.F. Records)  $21  - meditative & folky, ltd 800, already sold out from label

SOUNDTRACK:

Seazer, J.A.  ”Den’en Ni Shisu”  CD  (Showboat / Sky Station)  $28  - for Shuji Terayama film w/members of Tenjo Sajiki

WORLD:

Souleyman, Omar  ”Dabke 2020: Folk & Pop Sounds of Syria”  CD  (Sublime Frequencies)  $14  - fantastic Arabic pop music that really moves

Various  ”String of Pearls”  LP  (Mississippi Records)  $14  - cool collection of rare 78s from around the world

TONIGHT!!!
FREE IN STORE PERFORMANCE
FRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 2009
7:00 PM
MOOD ORGAN
COLIN ANDREW SHEFFIELD
from this week’s issue of The Stranger:The Score
Rejections and Emerald City Debacles
by Christopher Delaurenti
I still feel guilty for peering over his shoulder, but I had to look. Musicians usually launch their work into the world from onstage, yet here he was, doing one of the bravest things any artist can do: waiting in line at the post office to mail a stack of demo discs to various labels.
It’s an anonymous act that compels musicians to wonder at the fate of their work. Someone either says yes and agrees to champion the music, or the uncertain, uneasy void—few labels take the time or have the courtesy to send rejection letters anymore—continues and maybe grows.
Peering over Timm Mason’s shoulder, I espied his moniker, Mood Organ, affixed to packages bound for labels famous and unknown. Every artist gets rejected; by the time we find them, the ones we know and love have been ignored, rebuffed, and rejected countless times. Yet Mason seemed calm, as if mailing Christmas cards. The pensive, gloaming tones of the disc, Visiting a Burning Museum (Debacle), reflect this confidence. Mason inscribes his music with poetic details that reward headphone listening: lonesome guitar, rustles of wind, swelling tones, and keyboards that sound like they’re underwater, blurred by shivering eddies and ripples.
Mood Organ celebrates the release of the excellent Burning with an in-store show (Fri Aug 28, Dissonant Plane, 5459 Leary Ave NW, 784-5163, 7 pm, free). Previous performances have ranged from a set on solo electric bass to pieces for prepared piano and harmonium; expect an approach that explores a continuum from the visibly instrumental to abstract, unseen sound.
Another local sound artist, Colin Andrew Sheffield, shares the bill. Sheffield performs too infrequently; but when he does (full disclosure: I’ve only had three short conversations with him, but I opened for his duo performance with James Eck Rippie in 2007), he hews glacial, heaving drones from a turntable and an old-school sampler. Released earlier this year, Sheffield’s gorgeous Signatures (Invisible Birds) processes bird recordings, freezing skyward shrieks and swooping wings, into drones that refract hidden, shimmering harmonies.
Burning is another installment in “The Emerald City Debacle Vol. II,” an ongoing series by Debacle Records devoted to documenting local experimental music. From scabrous electronics such as on the eponymous Summon Thrull to charmingly perverted plunderphonics, most notably Fuck Rockin’ in American Airspace by the Broken Penis Orchestra, this series testifies to a gradual revival of the avant scene in Seattle. Be warned that Emerald City Debacle follows the current (and probably permanent) trend of avant CDs toward limited-run (usually 100 or less) discs that can get hard to find quickly. If you want it, get it. My list of discs I’ve missed gets frustratingly longer every week!
http://www.thestranger.com/seattle/the-score/Content?oid=2120557

• Ash Castles on the Ghost Coast CD  (Fleece Records / Wholly Other)  USED  $8  - Heather Murray (ex-Charalambides) & Shawn McMillen
• Bishop, Richard  ”God Damn Religion”  DVD + CD  (Locust Music)  USED  $12  - CD & DVD set, no guitar here, just dark experimental
• Cage, John  ”Variations IV”  CD  (Legacy International)  USED  $6  - fantastic sound collages, reissue of 2 LPs from 1965
• Cluster  ”71″  CD  (Water)  USED  $9  - early dark & cosmic electronics from Germany
• Cluster  ”II”  CD  (Spalax)  USED  $9  - really good!  like good spacey TG, but years earlier
• Crass  ”Christ the Album”  2 x CD  (Crass Records)  USED  $9  - 1982 album of anarcho-peace punk
• Culver C90  ((oTo))  USED  $2  - droney noises, 1 side only, C90,  ltd 50
• Doc Wör Mirran  ”Power of Positive Obscurity, The”  C60  (Old Europa Cafe)  USED  $2  - spacey lo-fi creations from Germany on Italian label C60
• Faust with Conrad, Tony  ”Live:  London - Queen Elisabeth Hall - February 1995″  C60  (Klangbad)  USED  $2  - live concert recording released by the band, C60
• Fennesz  ”Fennesz Plays”  CD EP  (Moikai)  USED  $4  - instrumental electronic glitch covers of Stones, 7 mins
• German Oak CD  (Radioactive)  USED  $9  - obscure Krautrock instrumentals from 1972
• Godz  ”Contact High”  CD  (ESP Disc / XYZ Music)  USED  $9  - drop out folk weirdness from 1966
• Harvester  ”Hemat”  CD  USED  $9  - great trance psychedelic rock w/folk touches from 1969
• Jackie-O Motherfucker  ”Europe 2002″  2 x CD  (Cast Exotic Archives)  USED  $12  - out of sight collective weirdness
• Kawabata Makoto  ”You Are The Moonshine”  CD  (Mar/Ino / Elsie & Jack Recordings)  USED  $15  - beautiful ambient sounds, ltd 150, long out of print
• Knaack, Donald  ”Dance Music”  CD  (RRRecords)  $8  - contemplative & creative experimental
• Kubli, Thom  ”Mondok Spots”  CD  (BMB Lab)  USED  $7  - very beautiful subtle drones like Rafael Toral, ltd 300
• L’infonie  ”Volume 333″  2 x CD  (Mucho Gusto)  USED  $12  - bizarre jazz, rock, experimental, classical mixture
• Lacy, Steve  ”Saxophone Special +”  CD  (Emanem)  USED  $9  - very free playing with some of the greats of the day
• Limbus 4  ”Mandalas”  CD  (Spalax)  USED  $9  - one of the greats of early free music w/ acoustic instrs.
• Lost in Translation  ”Wednesday Tapes, The”  C90  (Black Velvet Fuckere Recordings)  USED  $2  - old school cosmic electronics, C90
• Malanga, Gerard  ”Up From The Archives”  CD  (Sub Rosa)  USED  $8  - from the archives of this Warhol collaborator
• McLean Mix, The  ”Golden Age of Electronic Music, The”  CD  (CRI)  USED  $10  - great early analog electronics, out of print
• Miller, Donald  ”A Little Treatise on Morals”  CD  (Audible Hiss)  USED  $8  - solo pieces from Borbetomagus guitarist from 1982
• MNortham  ”Breathing Towers”  CD EP  (Dorobo)  USED  $8  - ltd 400, OOP, 22 minutes, lovely drone
• Moondog and his Friends CD  (Moondog’s Corner)  USED  $8  - reissue of 1953 material using tape overdubbing
• Möslang, Norbert / Guhl, Andy  ”Deep Voices”  CD  (Urthona)  USED  $9  - 1978 FMP debut of the duo that became Voice Crack
• Musica Elettronica Viva  ”The Sound Pool”  CD  (Spalax)  USED  $9  - 1969 large ensemble free for all, originally LP on BYG
• Nath, Pandit Pran  ”Raga Cycle”  CD  (Sri Moonshine)  USED  $9  - contemplative Indian classical w/La Monte Young
• Of  ”Rocks Will Open”  CD  (Digitalis)  USED  $8  - delicate acoustic sounds, Thuja member, ltd 500
• Oliveros, Pauline  ”Primordial Lift”  CD  (Table of the Elements)  USED  $9  - with guests Tony Conrad and David Grubbs
• Romero, Damion  ”Feedback in a Lover’s Telegraph”  CD  (Harbinger Sound)  USED  $7  - gentle and warm self-sustaining feedback drone
• Screamin’ Mee-Mees & Hot Scott Fischer  ”You’re Now In Our World: Warp Sessions ‘72″  CDR  (Slippy Town)  USED  $6  - lo-fi primitive “Godz meets Amon Düül”, CDR, ltd 125
• Smegma  ”Ism”  CD  (Tim/Kerr Records)  USED  $10  - long out of print 1993 album by these Portland weirdos
• Speare, Jed  ”Sound Works 1982-1987″  2 x CD  (Family Vineyard)  USED  $12  - great unreleased musique concrete from the 1980’s
• Throbbing Gristle  ”Live Volume 1, 1976-1978″  CD  (Mute Records / The Grey Area)  USED  $12  - out of print, early murky Industrial sounds, vellum cover
• Ya Ho Wha 13  ”Penetration, An Aquarian Symphony”  CD  (Cold Sweat)  USED  $9  - reissue of 1974 LP, acid-mantra psychedelic death trip

FREE IN STORE PERFORMANCEFRIDAY, AUGUST 28, 2009

7:00 PM

MOOD ORGAN

COLIN ANDREW SHEFFIELD

Mood Organ is the solo project of Seattle-based musician Timm Mason. Timm is best known as the bass player for diverse acts including funk juggernaut Eldridge Gravy & the Court Supreme, psych-rock supergroup Midday Veil, and instrumental hip-hop cover band Hamburger Pimp. Mood Organ is a platform for exploring different modes of listening and intersections between musical (& non-musical) genres. Each Mood Organ performance is unique; recent performances have included a solo performance on electric bass, a duet between saxophone and amplified objects, and a solo composition for harmonium and prepared piano. The first full-length album “Visiting a Burning Museum” has just been released on Debacle Records. Begun over 9 years ago, it is a meditation on memory and abstraction. The album folds instrumental performances, treated field recordings, and evolving drones into a towering block of sound that evokes power and sadness all at once. for fans of Drone, Charlambides, Gregg Kowalsky, Greg Davis.

http://www.myspace.com/moodorgan

Colin Andrew Sheffield was born in El Paso in 1976 and lived in various cities in Texas prior to 2004, when he relocated to the Seattle area. He is a self-taught drummer, playing in various collaborative situations in his home state before eventually making a total transition to electronic music. After initially working with exclusively digital sources, in recent years, Sheffield has refined his approach and now focuses on the strict re-contextualization of other commercially available recordings. His aim is to distill the essential qualities of these works and to then utilize that essence for new recordings. Usually only very brief sections of the original works are selected. These raw components are then contracted, expanded, layered, and/or otherwise processed until something new is forged. The resultant music is an atmospheric soundscape, gradually shifting and unfolding, offering subtle nuance and quiet restraint. His recordings often seem to have much in common with ambient electronic music, though are equally akin to “plunderphonic” audio collage. In 1998 Sheffield founded the Elevator Bath Recording label which has continually issued experimental works from a variety of artists from the United States and abroad. Sheffield has released a number of solo recordings since 1998, including 2005’s ‘First Thus,’ his debut long-player. His collaboration with turntablist James Eck Rippie is ongoing. 2009 will saw the release of Sheffield’s sophomore full-length solo release, ‘Signatures,’ via the Invisible Birds label.

http://www.myspace.com/colinandrewsheffield

Two very special items from Japan:

Akio Suzuki “Ki-date” DVD & book
A beautiful retrospective of this very special Japanse sound artist.  The 210 minute all region NTSC DVD features live performances on Akio’s instruments such as the Analapos and Suzuki Type Glass Harmonica, as well as exhibition views and field recordings.  The performances are sublime as Suzuki lets loose delicate and magical sounds from his instruments and plays with small objects.  Also in the box is a 190 color catalog with texts in Japanese and English (translations by Alan Cummings) documenting 40 years of sound creation with many lovely photographs.  Also included in this set is a map of the location that Suzuki marked for ‘Oto-Date’.   This on going projects marks good listening spots in urban areas with Suzuki’s whimsical icon combining feet and ears.  This map shows the locations around the museum that Akio liked and the DVD documents these spots.  In a stroke of genius the video faces the opposite direction of any action so that sounds are heard, but the visuals are mostly stationary, yet impart the sense of the place.  The performance recordings on the DVD, these sounds are also recorded by Kuwayama Kijima of Lethe.  Documents of Suzuki’s work are always hard to find and therefore in demand, so don’t miss your chance to pick up this set!

Lethe “Catastrophe Point #6″ CD
Privately released limited edition CD from 2005 packaged on an A4 (about letter size) cardboard sleeve with beautiful artwork by Isao Mizutani.
Nagoya based Kiyoharu Kuwayama has an interest in reverberant spaces, recording under bridges and flyovers as well as in warehouse and Shinto temples at night. Although he occasionally employs cello, his works tends to explore space and perspective in utterly unconventional ways. Typically, he favours objects found in situ to sound the acoustic environment and is as likely to use a chair scraped along the floor as a standard musical instrument. But music this most definitely is. The first piece on offer here foregrounds what sounds like a handful of pebbles being clicked together against a distant backdrop of scraped sheet metal. The thickness of the room’s acoustics lends the whole an almost frightening clarity, and there’s an unreality to the way the two different reverberant layers combine that only adds to the sense of unease. We’re thrown into a subtly heightened acoustic realm, in which scale and perspective are altered, to disquieting psychological effect. The second piece heightens and complicates the acoustic picture even further, and increases the density of the sonic activity. The sound sources here seem to be bundles of sticks, bottles, tea trays and iron girders thrown down lift shafts. Once again the ear tries to make sense of the altered relationships Kuwayama set up between loud and soft, close and distant. Slowly, the piece starts to focus more and more strongly on a huge, dark vibration at the furthest end of the acoustic spectrum, which builds in intensity, racking up the tension and subtly disturbing the mind’s equilibrium. By this point, the music sounds like it’s taking piece in a vast, pitch black aircraft hangar of the soul. - Keith Moline (Wire No. 264)
Volcanic Tongue made comparisons with Christoph Heemann, Sean Meehan and AMM when describing this one.

Four new titles from Hospital Productions in for the first time:

Cold Cave “Cremations” CD - Old style minimal synth - simple melodies and rhythms with monotone vocals.  Cold and perverse atmosphere.  This collects tracks from the instantly out of print 7″, cassette and LP releases.

The Grey Wolves “Judgement” CD - Lo-fi, creepy, ritual industrial from the U.K. originally released on cassette sometime in the 1980’s.  The Grey Wolves were still associated with T.O.P.Y. at this early point in their history as can be seen on the logos from the original cover art reproduced here.  The Grey Wolves are better known for power electronics, so this is an unusual release for them and sounds more like Trev’s other project Nails ov Christ.

Malkuth “Sefirah Gevurah” CD - Underground, raw and rough black metal from New York.  This is their second album, the first one was vinyl only and sold out very fast.  Malkuth features members of Zashiki-Warashi, No Neck Blues Band, and K-Salvatore and sounds nothing like those bands.

Yellow Tears “Don’t Cry” 12″ - Dark and psychologically disturbing trio from New York.  The sounds of pain, fear and dread.

Also, back in stock:
Controlled Bleeding “Shanked and Slithering” CD - totally violent electronics/vocals/junk metal assault
Jason Crumer “Ottoman Black” CD - heavy noise and thick drones
Diapsiquir “Pacta Daemoniarum/Crasse” 2 x CD - reissue of two rare black metal French CDs from 1999 and 2001
Kevin Drumm “Imperial Distortion” 2 x CD - deep and minimal stark atmospheres
Carlos Giffoni / Prurient “Heavy Rain Returns” CD - deep throbbing analog power electronics noise