Five "Soleil Clandestin" soundscapes using abstract voice, guitar, electronics, field recordings & percussion from sound artists Bruno Duplant and Pierre Gerard, on the surface peaceful, minimal and using space and silence, but buried inside are disquieting additions through vocal abstractions placed in unusual position to the sound; curious and captivating.

A set of beautiful electro-acoustic compositions, dream-like and rich in details using sources of acoustic instruments, field recordings, guitar, electronics and voice, organized into hazy and beautiful reflections, with contributions from Margaret Hermant on xylophone & violin, Jeremy Young on electroncis, and Lee Ranaldo providing field recordings and voice.

Bringing together NY drummer/percussionist John Hollenbeck, also on prepared piano, with Berlin bassist Bernhard Meyer for an album that blends textural rock, electronic and jazz approaches in 9 elusively calm yet structurally turbulent pieces, using complex systems of cross rhythms against atmospheric immersion, occasionally disruptive but generally eccentrically controlled and exploratory.

Schizophrenically skronky improv of ea-cutups and semi-maniacal segments that resolve to near-stillness from the West Coast TONED trio of Nathan Corder on electronics, Leo Suarez on drums, and Tom Weeks on sax, using a nonlinear and nonhierarchical organizational process and multiple layers of compositional feedback loops to create unpredictably bizarre and overtly fun music.

The soundtrack for Dutch/Belgium/Italian co-production "Porselein" (Porcelain), a psychological drama by Jenneke Boeijink, recorded with cellist Francesco Guerri and using a motif from Henry Purcell's "The Fairy Queen", the album release including 12 additional tracks; powerful, emotional and passionate music of great tension and brilliant performances from Guerri.

An album of ritualistic rhythm and hypnotic drumming with subliminal field recordings and environmental additions from Chicago drummer Mike Weiss (Zelienople), using mbira, tongue drum, dholak, changgo, bass drum, cymbals, gongs, singing bowls, bells, dharma bell, and moktak over 8 pieces that express, reflect and meditate on the 2018 winter solstice.

Moving between "object stations" during their performance, Japanese improviser and sound artist Ryoko Akama (Lappetites) and Quebecois sound artist Anne-F Jacques create a flurry of minimal activity, intensely detailed and unidentifiable yet compatible sound using minimal electronics, activated objects, and Jacques' "contraptions and erratic devices".

Viennese-born, Berlin-based electro-acoustic composer Werner Dafeldecker (Polwechsel, Fennesz, &c) creates an intense and beautiful musique concrete and acousmatic journey in two parts, examining "perspective, extreme subjectivity and the specters that haunt our auditory worlds" through mysterious sound and enveloping sonic construction, a profound and riveting work.

Kruger National Park in the north-east corner of South Africa is the subject of Eric La Casa and Philip Samartzis's audio exploration, using field recordings made over 10 days in and around the park, and taking them into the studio to organize them into an aural representation of the park's exotic mystery, placidity and tension, with a tinge of the modern world nearby.

First stock of this 1999 7" from French sound artist Eric La Casa created as part of Joe Colley's "Explorer" series, the title translating to "the shore breathing" where each composition develops from field recordings of water, the first part more naturalist and adhering to the initial recordings, the second using sound processing to create something unique and mesmerizing.

Recorded in concert at Tokyo's SuperDeluxe in 2014, electronic artists and composers Brunhild Ferrari and Jim O'Rourke use tapes, electronics and synths to create these two monumental works of electroacoustic improvisation, with sources including material from Luc Ferrari's "Exercises d'Improvisation", O'Rourke revising and remixing the material in 2019 for this LP release.

"Weltformat" translates to "world-class", an apt description of the 20 year collaboration between sound explorers, improvisers and rock legends Bo Wiget and Luigi Archetti, heard in this diverse album of soundscapes and sonic intersections, with Archetti on guitar, mandolin, & electronics, and Wiget on cello, electronics, & vocals, fascinating their listener in shades of dark and light.

"Weltformat" translates to "world-class", an apt description of the 20 year collaboration between sound explorers, improvisers and rock legends Bo Wiget and Luigi Archetti, heard in this diverse album of soundscapes and sonic intersections, with Archetti on guitar, mandolin, & electronics, and Wiget on cello, electronics, & vocals, fascinating their listener in shades of dark and light.

Filmakers and composers Nicolas Humbert and Marc Parisotto revisit the tapes recorded by Jean Vapeur for the film by Humbert & Werner Penzel, "Step Across the Border" with soundtrack by Fred Frith, extracting more of Vapeur's fascinating field recordings and adding music by Fred Frith with additional music & voice from Tom Cora, Iva Bittova, John Zorn, &c.

Percussionist, Quakebasket label leader, and experimental sound artist Tim Barnes both subverts and respect the forms of electronica by turning it on its side, extracting unusual rhythms and structures from rhythmic elements and samples, at times following conventional direction and then breaking off into Barne's instinctive drive for abstraction and diversion.

Two astounding and wide-ranging electroacoustic improvisations from 5 prominent musicians on the Swiss experimental scene--Joke Lanz (turntables), Jason Kahn (synth, radio, mixer), Norbert Moslang (cracked everyday electronics), Gunter Muller (ipods & electronics), and Christian Weber (bass, revolver)--captured live at the 2018 Mikroton Mikroten Festival in Kaliningrad and Moscow.

A unique album blurring acoustic recordings from saxophonist Mats Gustafsson with the electronic machinations and rhythms of Wendy Gondeln, aka Albert Oehlen, a German experimental electronic artist, the two inviting Martin Siewert for additional guitar on two tracks, and Wolfgang Voight to remix two tracks; funky, unpredictable, amusing, and seductively tantalizing.

Investigating the possibilities of instability with synthesizers and electronic instruments, sound artists Eryck Abecassis (France) and Lars Akerlund (Sweden) present 7 impressive tracks of "Dark Energy" in two parts, combining electronics and modular synth, with credits to VICC (Visby International Centre for Composers) and EMS (Electronic Music Studio, Stockholm).

A double CD of experimental composition from Malaysian sound artist Goh Lee Kwang, hypnotic works of strangely repeating glitch that bookend shorter works of rich percussive abstractions, including a work with processed voice and an extended percussive "Ritual", singular pieces reflecting Kwang's curious mind and long experience merging aberrant and subtle sound.

With understated grooves and the presence of Necks keyboardist Chris Abrahams it's easy to compare Necks with this Berlin-based band, formed in 2004 with Andrea Ermke on minidiscs, Marcello Busato on drums, and Arthur Rother on electric guitar, but the distinction is heard in their unusual sound sources, mixing electronic, synthetic and concrete sounds in hallucinatory ways.

Electroacoustic composer Michel Banabila compiles his dynamic works for dance & movement in this beautifully pressed limited double LP, presenting two 2019 works--'Dragonfly II' for "A Trace of Inevitability" (Yin Yue - Pennsylvania Ballet), and "Illicit Acquirement" for "Enough" (Patrick O"Brien - CUNY Dance Initiative)--and six prior pieces featuring his work with Conny Janssen Danst & Annabelle Lopez Ochoa.

Winter 2019 issue of Canada's premiere new music magazine and CD, with articles on Buffy Sainte-Marie, Pierre-Yves Martel, Jennifer Thiessen, Wesley Shen, Julia Kent, Tim Olive, Kimia Koochakzadeh-Yazdi, the CD including works by each, plus reviews of recent Canadian and international recordings as well as the fourth annual Calgary New Music Festival.

Jim O'Rourke expands on his recent electronic work from his Steamroom studio with this exceptional 4-CD set of the 4-part "To Magnetize Money and Catch a Roving Eye", presumably including the Serge synthesizer, each expansive piece building dreamlike environments that shift and wander in purposeful ways as sound emerges and disappears into a beautifully threatening cloud.

Their first release in 2000 performing Cornelius Cardew's "Treatise", for 20 years the Formanex quartet of sound artists, conceptualists and experimenters Anthony Taillard, Christophe Havard, Emmanuel Leduc, and Julien Ottavi are heard here in collaborations with Keith Rowe, Kasper T. Toeplitz, Ralf Wehowsky, Seth Cluett, Michael Pisaro, Radu Malfatti, &c.

A split cassette between Wilmington sound artists Joshua Marquez, a Filipino-American composer, guitarist, and activist who explores the liminal space between tone and noise; and Mr. Stonecipher, aka Ryan L Lewis IV, a sound artist and filmmaker who works with dramatic sound and feedback of a cinematic quality, often employing unusual objects as source.

A wonderfully unique and idiosyncratic album of voice and electronics from the duo of Amirtha Kidambi and Lea Bertucci, in active and surprising pieces using word-less vocal expresion and abstract utterance, altered live by electronics as the two interact in complement and confluence; the final piece was captured live at NYC's The Kitchen.

Swedish bass player Egil Kalman, here on modular syntheizer, joins Norwegian guitarist Fredrik Rasten for a lovely album of drifting electronics and beautifully entwining acoustic guitar, unhurriedly developing environments of warm, slowly evolving chord structures that show influences from players like Catherine Lamb or the Wandelweiser collective.

Swedish bass player Egil Kalman, here on modular syntheizer, joins Norwegian guitarist Fredrik Rasten, for a lovely album of drifting electronics and beautifully entwining acoustic guitar, unhurriedly developing environments of warm, slowly evolving chord structures that show influences from players like Catherine Lamb or the Wandelweiser collective.

Sound explorer and composer Jeph Jerman created the 11 pieces on this release while living in the Knob Hill neighborhood of Colorado Springs, using unusual recording techniques he refers to as "guerrilla recordings" like tossing tape decks off buildings or putting them inside running clothes dryers, inching tape manually over the heads, exploiting creative field recordings, &c. &c.

Chik White (Darcy Spidle of rural Nova Scotia) uses a jaw harp, and Xuan Ye (Toronto) uses voice, percussion and field recordings, in this series of rich, peculiar, startling and altogether satisfying recordings that investigate a variety of approaches to their instruments, taking them to the fringes but bringing the listener along with them; oddly entertaining.

David Lee Myers began creating feedback music in 1989, originally under the name Arcane Device, developing unique approaches to harnessing feedback between audio devices in ways their manufactures did not intend; since 2014 he has used a set of new devices that allow intense control and beauty through vibrational interactions, as heard in this, his 18th solo album of feedback music.

Italian sound artist Mauro Diciocia presents the second installment in a trilogy of related recordings, informally named "Le Musiche", using field recordings from a variety of settings mostly around Salento in southern Italy, organizing his recordings to create auditory sketches in sound, telling abstract yet compelling stories that envelop the listener.

A fly-on-the-wall hang out with virtual drinking buddies--saxophonist and pocket trumpeter Joe McPhee and his brother Charlie, and sound artist Graham Lambkin, who brought along his son Oliver--hanging at Charlie's in Poughkeepsie, NY, captured by an open mic as they tip back a few, play records, instruments, discussing life and music, and end in a singalong.

Minimalist Chilean guitarist Cristian Alvear and Tim Olive first played together in October 2016, doing three concerts in Japan, Alvear returning to Japan in October of 2017 for additional performances in Kyoto and Osaka, then spending a day recording in Kobe; this single improvised piece he result of that day, heard as it was recorded, with a few structural edits.

Montreal-area's Mystery and Wonder Records duo of Elizabeth Millar on clarinet and Craig Pedersen on trumpet met sound artist Tim Olive in Tokyo's famed Gok Sound studio to record these absorbing electroacoustic improvisations, employing hand-made microphones in metal and wooden tubes, corrupted consumer sound devices, and electro-magnetism through analog circuits.

Using toys and handmade instruments alongside guitar, bass, synths, plundered recordings and electronics, the French Toys'R'Noise trio are a live performing group that borrows from electro-beat rock forms with overtones of IDM/ambient forms, building extended sections and then amusing with quick-witted sections that bridge a clear love of the music.

'Spilla' means 'to play' in the language of Neapolitan musicians, and playing here are NY guitarist and composer Elliott Sharp and Italian guitarist Sergio Sorrentino, presenting world premier recordings of 4 works recorded live in Vercelli, Italy: two improvisations and two graphic scores performed on electric guitar with incredible technique and passion.

A beautifully hypnotic album of saxophone, accompanied by Pan-Ney, Shruti Box and Organ, recorded in overdubs by composer/wind player Werner Durand in this 2nd chapter of his trilogy focused on the Pan-Ney, a self-built instrument for repetitive foundations, as Durand draws on elements of nature, mythology, dance, religion, literature and folklore.

Blending live improvisation with studio composition & production, NY-based Dutch drummer, pianist and composer Flin van Hemmen spent 3 years making recordings with guitarist Todd Neufeld, double bassist Eivind Opsvik and himself, transforming them with layering, studio effects, processors and field recordings to create these intensely fascinating compositions.

Stochastic music for percussion and synthesizers from New York avant conceptualist and keyboardist Charlemagne Palestine, here on piano & electronics, with the Italian duo Trrma' of Giovanni Todisco on percussion and Guiseppe Candiano on synth, in two side-long works of irregular rhythm, complexity and dissonance that build and recede in a suspenseful journey.

Daphne Oram & Vera Gray's "Listen Move & Dance" series of BBC programs were devised as a radical new technique to help British schoolchildren learn how to dance, Gray's sections arranging short adaptations of classical pieces by Bartok, Stravinsky, Shostakovich, contrasted with Oram's electronic section, adding a sci-fi/Dr. Who element for the more imaginative children...

Recorded in the mid-90s, Livebatts! was a project of John White (Cornelius Cardew, Scratch Orchestra) developed to exploit "toy" keyboards of the 80s--cheap battery-driven instruments that hold tremendous potential for "serious" music-making--used here in a playful quartet with vocalist MJ Coldiron, Andrea Rocca (guitar & samples) and Nancy Ruffer (electrified flute).

An extended and rich confluence of strings from R Keenan Lawler and John Krausbauer, using resonator guitar and banjo, sustained tones that intertwine in a beautiful and optimistic drone, minimalistic yet drenched in a profusion of harmonic detail; a beautiful and elusive dream mixing between an Indian raga and an alien electronic environment.

To mark the 90th anniversary of his birth, Transversales Disques is reissuing electraoustic composer and pioneer Luc Ferrari's 1989 work "Photophonie", along with "Il etait une fois" (1973), "Trans-Voices" (1992), and "Leica" (1977), in a great overview of his work as co-founder of the GRM and with French Radio's Groupe de Musique Concrete.

Merging the US band Low of Alan Sparhawk (guitar, voice), Mimi Parker (voice, drums), Zak Sally (bass) and Ed Coxon (violin, viola) with Ashley Wales of the UK band Spring Heel Jack, in an EP of lush slow moving and beautiful songs, structurally interesting pieces of beautiful abstraction; unavailable for two decades and lovingly reissued now on the Treader imprint.

Italian sonic explorer Francesco Gregoretti uses his drumkit like a lead instrument, amplifying and modifying its sound through effects, as he pursues his varied "Imploded" bands (Strongly Imploded, Grizzly Imploded) fueled by the mathematics of Chaos Theory, here with guitarist Maurizio Argenziano in an album of dense sound, from near-minimal to highly interactive.

The ninth album from the enduring trio of Keiji Haino, Jim O'Rourke, and Oren Ambarchi, recorded in 2015 at Tokyo's SuperDeluxe, with both Ambarchi and O'Rourke performing on drums and percussion, O'Rourke also using a Hammond Organ and Ambarchi on flute, while Haino asserts himself on guitar, electronics and voice, in 2 groove-based pieces and 2 side-long epics.

Electro-psychedelic explorer Chester Hawkins presenting two live performances in Washington DC -- one recorded in isolation at Intangible Arts' studio (4th September 2018) and one in public at Rhizome community arts space (8th September 2018) -- improvised autopsies of Lutoslawski's String Quartet by means of three granular synth engines and one tape-edit/concrete emulator.

Pulling inspiration from disparate influences such as early liturgical music, Ornette Coleman, Laurie Anderson, Yoko Ono, Milford Graves, and composers Morton Feldman and Lou Harrison, Kid Millions and Sarah Bernstein create a cyclical form of spontaneous thematic music through powerful electronics, wild vocalizations, and unrelenting drum textures.

Drawn from 305 traditional ballads from England and Scotland alongside their American variants, anthologised by Francis James Child during the second half of the nineteenth century, are here sung by Ed Pettersen in the fascinating intersection of traditional lyrics and experimental interpretations of melodies, performed by the 11-piece London Experimental Ensemble.

DC electronic explorer Chester Hawkins releases this limited edition album of 50 copies shaped in a metal bullet that unscrews to reveal a USB drive with more than 4 hours of extended forays into psychedelic electronics, synth and tabletop guitar, journeys of hard drone & abstract concrete elements, in mp3 & wav format with a pdf, housed in a handsome black case.

The ninth album from the enduring trio of Keiji Haino, Jim O'Rourke, and Oren Ambarchi, recorded in 2015 at Tokyo's SuperDeluxe, with both Ambarchi and O'Rourke performing on drums and percussion, O'Rourke also using a Hammond Organ and Ambarchi on flute, while Haino asserts himself on guitar, electronics and voice, in 2 groove-based pieces and 2 side-long epics.

Recordings from the 4-channel sound composition for the ESS Florasonic installation series at Lincoln Park Conservatory in Chicago, of Rob Mazurek's work using recordings of electric eels from National Institute of Research and Technology in Manaus, Brazil, combined with analog/digital synthesis to create environments of beautiful undulating and radiant sonic textures.

One of three releases in Rob Mazurek's Marfa Trio, recorded in Marfa, TX, using 106 distorted still images and fragmented skipping sound from video shot at Abbaye Royal de Fontevraud, France in 2005, repurposed for this intense and wild sound work which processes the images through modular synth and computer, shaped by Mazurek's unique approach to sound.

Oren Ambarchi renews the focus on his unique approach to the electric guitar, joining with Downtown NY Brazilian percussionist Cyro Baptista on congas, shakers and berimbau, in a duo based on Ambarchi's explorative playing, also conjuring organ and piano tones, as each side-long piece take the listener on a journey of passionate playing of subtlety and warmth.

One of two reissues from the collaboration of Important Records and the Pauline Oliveros Trust, this solo accordion album from Pauline Oliveros self-released in 1987 on cassette is a rich album in the vein of her Deep Listening work, two warmly beautiful pieces using a just intonation accordion and her Expanded Instrument System in order to bend time and pitch.

The third release from the US Southwest audio exploring duo of Steve Jansen and Jeph Jerman, expanding on their previous cassette releases with two works recorded in Cottonwood, AZ and Phoenix, AZ; curious and compelling sonic environments using unidentifiable sound sources that layer and intertwine, each building and receding enigmatically.

Originally released on cassette on the Netherlands Counter Culture Chronicles label, this expanded and revised edition of Jerman's confounding album of fragmented vocal collage along with voices, hiss, birds, snippets of radio broadcasts and other field recordings, includes a 72-page book of texts and recording information, a unique and confounding album of sound.

Varying the instrument and proportions of acoustic or electric presentation straddling the foreground/background dynamic for each track, Appalachian Trance Metal guitarist Killick presents his first vinyl LP to extend his vast CD discography; a worthy and curious album of solo guitar, acoustic and electroacoustic work that belongs in any guitar enthusiast's collection.

Fall 2019 issue of Canada's premier music magazine covering contemporary, improvisation and experimental music, plus reviews of recordings, books, and events; this issue has articles on Ana Sokolovic, Charlie Morrow, Nadah El Shazly, Laraaji, Amy Brandon, William Kuo, Sami Blanco, Silla and Rise, Mystery & Wonder Records, including a CD with tracks from the same.

Portland Oregon composer and sound artist Jeff Lane, co-founder of the Chicago/Portland record label Never Anything, as his alter-ego Tereshkova in a large work of electronic composition, part concrete, part acousmatic, spanning two cassettes with four side-long pieces, each an extended journey in mood, motion, perplexing sources and embrace-ably interesting.

Conceived and constructed over 16 years, composer, electronic artist & percussionist Matt Weston employs graphic and personal notation systems with elements including clandestine recordings in concert halls and athletic buildings while they were not in use, rural field recordings, and the sound of cars driving over a bridge at Weston's conducting; unique and fascinating.

After temporarily losing his studio workspace, Fennesz moved his gear to a bedroom in his flat, recalling his earliest setups from the 90s; inspired, he recorded this album of shimmering, swirling buoyant electronic sound of wide range and complexity, augmented with vocals by Katharina Caecilia Fennesz & Mira Waldmann, and field recordings by Manfred Neuwirth.

Oren Ambarchi renews the focus on his unique approach to the electric guitar, joining with Downtown NY Brazilian percussionist Cyro Baptista on congas, shakers and berimbau, in a duo based on Ambarchi's explorative playing, also conjuring organ and piano tones, as each side-long piece take the listener on a journey of passionate playing of subtlety and warmth.

Fellow Canadians, Montreal's Ambiances Magnetiques collective member, turntablist and electronics artist Martin Tetrault meets Japan-based electronic explorer Tim Olive performing on magnetic pickups, in their first album despite having performed sporadically across three decades: 4 rich improvisations minimally edited, shaping sound in compelling ways.

Recording in Saskatoon in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan the day before their performance at the Sounds Like Festival, audio explorer Tim Olive brings his magnetic pickups in a first meeting with Doreen Girard performing on a prepared tsymbaly, a Ukranian hammer dulcimer, for a single, unusually evolving, and wonderfully rich improvisation.

Swedish conceptual artist Leif Elggren developed this second album in his trilogy using "The Motor", a soundwork that he's built over many years from basic fragments of sound used in installations and performances, aggregated here in an expanded form as a continuous drone, harsh on the surface but complex in its layers and sonic collisions.

The second album from the trio of Ferran Fages (acoustic turntable), Ruth Barberan (trumpet), and Alfredo Costa Monteiro (accordion) expands on their first "Atolon" album with these two recordings of intense electroacoustic improvisation, a mixture of ritual, controlled chaos, mysterious and often disruptively provocative sound, and other inexplicable evolutions.

Recording sound comes naturally to Japanese audio explorer Toshiya Tsunoda, capturing and cataloging the audio world he encountered since childhood; in the 90s he set out to observe vibrations from optimum perspectives, using small and contact microphones, and compiling 3 albums of Field Recording Archives, collected here with 2 CDs of previously unpublished recordings.

Collaborating previously in Piiptsjilling and their duo "Drawn", Mariska Baars (Soccer Committee) and Rutger Zuydervelt (Machinefabriek) come together again for this exquisite album, the title translating to "water", a beautiful combination of electronic timbres and voice that weave together and drift, ebbing and flowing like a mysteriously elegant stream.

A 33 rpm 7" from Washington, DC sound artist Chester Hawkins, which "contains highly concentrated extracts" of two remixes of live recordings at Logan Fringe Arts Space and Red Onion Records, from his limited-edition USB release "Cops Need Serial Numbers"; mesmerizing and hypnotic electronics from a masterful performer and kosmiche explorer.

Producer & bassist Marc Urselli devised this first meeting between himself and Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo, filmaker/guitarist Jim Jarmusch, and drummer Balazs Pandi's, recording in Urselli's NY studio to capture these live analog recordings of improvisations using no overdubs, a twilight set of evolving and absorbing explorations merging rock & experimental approaches.

Producer & bassist Marc Urselli devised this first meeting between himself and Sonic Youth guitarist Lee Ranaldo, filmaker/guitarist Jim Jarmusch, and drummer Balazs Pandi's, recording in Urselli's NY studio to capture these live analog recordings of improvisations using no overdubs, a twilight set of evolving and absorbing explorations merging rock & experimental approaches.

Czech improviser and sound musician Tomislav Federsel started work on this project in 2002, remixing in experimental forms the songs of Czech folk musician Wabi Danek, a project Federsel scrapped and rebuilt three times, Jaroslav Tarnovski joining in this ultimate version of the rich, imaginative and well-considered renderings of Danek's music.

Describing their approach to their submersive electroacoustic music as a seance, the Czech Republic septet IQ+1 with Peter Vrba, George Bagdasarov, Veronika Hladka, Jana Kneschke, Michal Zboril, and Katerina Bilejova release their 3rd album, a mix of strings, trumpet, clarinet, harmonium, synth, electronics & field recordings, creating a virtual acousmatic music of great detail.