Relative Pitch Records is making a great case for becoming a favorite label of mine. There are so many great releases covering the best of improvisational and free music that I’ll probably go broke trying to purchase all of them. It’s fitting to make my first review that of avant-harpist Continue Reading
Downloads
Various Artists – Compost Records: Digital & Rare Vols. 1 & 2
Compost Records have released two exquisite CDs covering the best of downtempo electronica. Familiar names include A Forest Mighty Black (featuring Rainer Trüby) , Peter Kruder (of Kruder & Dorfmeister), Funkstörung and Minus 8. These comps cover a lot of ground and show the depth and diversity of the label.
Manne Skafvenstedt – Archway
This was a happy surprise. Manne Skafvenstedt is a Swedish pianist, composer and producer who works in the fields of jazz, ambient, electronics and sound design. His latest album, Archway, is a calming experience. There is a sort of sweetness to this music, where the listener actually feels good enjoying Continue Reading
Secret Agent – Mata Hari EP
Combining surf rock, garage rock, touches of psych and having a generally lo-fi vibe to it, Mexico City’s Secret Agent combine a couple of cool instrumentals with two sung tracks, including the title track, Mata Hari, featuring Vince Montes Rivera, which you can listen to below:
Neon Noodle – Swamplands
Neon Noodle mixes lo-fi noise with what sounds like horror soundtracks, touches of vaporwave and a bass line that reminds me of something one could hear out of an early 80s garage post-punk or experimental cassette demo. It’s crunchy, but interesting. I’d like to see how Neon Noodle develop as Continue Reading
Daniel Casimir – Safe (Part I) (feat. Moses Boyd, Nubya Garcia, Al MacSween & James Copus)
Bassist Daniel Casimir is a young lion of London’s jazz scene. This is a one-off composition in preparation for a full album coming out later this year on Jazz re:freshed, and it features some of the best instrumentalists active today. Observe the names on this track. Each is leaving a Continue Reading
Andrew Paine & Richard Youngs – Bonus Disc
This has to be one of the most charmingly weird, frankly unclassifiable discs I’ve heard in a while. Andrew Paine & Richard Youngs manage to pull together a collection that should sound like a mess, yet it’s a rather enjoyable one. The music goes from lo-fi disco tracks (which for Continue Reading
Clara Engel – A New Skin
Clara Engel is based in Toronto, Canada. Her work has been described as “Folk-Noir” or “minimalist holy blues,” and who am I to disagree? This takes the best elements of neofolk, stripped-down to just voice, cigar box guitar, electric guitar, melodica and harmonica, and it sounds like a rare self-pressed Continue Reading
Hideki Umezawa & Andrew Pekler – Two Views Of Amami Oshima
Electroacoustic music inspired by painting and field recordings done in the Ryuku Islands off the coast of the Japanese mainland. This definitely caught my attention. Edições CN out of Antwerp, Belgium released this album in 2020, and it features the works of Japanese composer Hideki Umezawa and the Samarkand, Uzbekistan Continue Reading
Steven Severin – 23 Wounds of Julius Caesar
Today is the Ides of March, once a day of celebration during Rome’s peak (and a deadline for settling debts), now remembered as the anniversary of the assassination of Julius Caesar. Former Siouxsie & The Banshees bassist Steven Severin makes available his ambient experimental work commemorating the event.