巴亚宛 Bayawan are heavy psychedelic muqam music from Xinjiang. From Old Heaven Books’ Bandcamp site: “”Bayawan” is the common name for Muqam music used by the Dolan people. Bayawan, or Dolan Muqam, is a unique form of folk music and one of the most important cultural heritages of the Uyghurs in Xinjiang, China. Generally speaking, Muqam is a form of large-scale suites which include songs, dances, and instrumental sections, in which the development of music often features a significant degree of improvisation. The Muqam of the Uyghurs is characterized by its diversity of musical styles. Apart from the classical Twelve…
-
-
Sometimes experimental music can produce either dour listening or tie itself to miserable cover art showing the worst of humanity in some sort of fetishistic way. Not so with this release! London-based Chinese composer Li Yilei’s album concentrates more of a happy, carefree childhood, where, as she puts it, “…learn[ed] about fear and fearlessness, love and despair, grief and glee, curiosity and mistakes.” Sitting back and listening to this after hearing my own Chinese geography students caterwauling for nearly two hours is balm for the soul. A gentle listen that deserves a more appropriate tag than “experimental,” as much as…
-
Here we have a single track by Hong Kong-based urban musician leungarto providing a chilled out, relaxing take on some amalgamation of City Pop and vaporwave, but done in a much more soulful way.
-
Today is a workday for us in Beijing, so there is no review today, but I did want to point you to an Indonesian band called Senyawa, who is featured on Rafaelle Pezzella’s incredible Unexplained Sounds Group‘s digipak retrospective called the Far East Music Collection. It is a reissue of three seminal compilations covering experimental music from China, Indonesia and the Far East in general. The set looks gorgeous, and Senyawa‘s contribution is mind-blowing.
-
Saadet Türköz is an international treasure. Born to Kazakh and Turkish parents in Istanbul in 1961, she has developed a style that comfortably blends Central Asian traditional music with free jazz. A very pleasant listen.
-
Maybe Mars Records out of my new home city of Beijing (I have to meet these guys one day) put out an indie rock album in 2019 that sounds as good as anything the early Cure ever put out. Brilliant work by Future Orients, indeed!
-
One more from Harbin. We will be back to normal posting tomorrow.
-
No reviews today as I am in Harbin, China for a rest.
-
-
Li Xing is a Shanghai-based psychedelic noise-rock guitarist who produces a sludgy, powerful album which is reminiscent of Keiji Haino’s mid-period guitar noise era.