Utility FogYour weekly fix of postfolkrocktronica, dronenoise, power ambient, post-everything improv... and more? Sunday nights from 9 to 11pm on FBi Radio, 94.5 FM in Sydney, Australia. LISTEN ONLINE now! Click here to find the start time for the show at your location! {Hey! Sign up to Utilityfoglet and get playlists emailed to you after each show!}
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Sunday, 29th of September, 2013
Playlist 29.09.13 (10:10 pm)
Big show tonight with a bit special on Machinedrum on the occasion of the release of his amazing new album Vapor City, plus new sounds from Banabila & Machinefabriek and another of my favourite artists, Justin K Broadrick as Jesu... LISTEN AGAIN via the link at the bottom, or stream on demand from FBi! Jesu - comforter [Avalanche Recordings/Daymare] Listen again — ~107MB
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Sunday, 22nd of September, 2013
Playlist 22.09.13 (10:08 pm)
Here we are again... Tonight, an interview with Satu Vänskä from ACO Underground a week away from their next performance, plus strings, folk and idm! LISTEN AGAIN via the link at the bottom, or stream on demand from FBi! With a decidedly strings-oriented beginning to the show, tonight we start with the magnificent solo album from Toronto's Sarah Neufeld, violinist in the Arcade Fire, sure, but also in the excellent postrock ensemble Bell Orchestre, from whom we heard a pretty crazy cover of a crazy Aphex Twin track among others. Neufeld's album in comparison is pared down to almost solely violin, with almost no overdubs from what I can hear - similar in approach to collaborator (and guest on one track) Colin Stetson's sax material, with Neufeld replacing his multiphonics with double-stops and sinuous lines that give the effect of multiple melodic lines. Gorgeous and unique stuff. Next up, I had a chat with the extremely talented Satu Vänskä, violinist in the Australian Chamber Orchestra and the main driving force behind their leftfield and unusual project ACO Underground. We learnt that ACO concertmaster Richard Tognetti is actually behind some of the arrangements, including the pretty amazing Nirvana cover we heard tonight (you should really check it out on YouTube!), and it was great to hear how much they relish the challenge and opportunity that comes from playing non-classical music in non-classical venues. They're doing something really valuable here. Keeping it stringy, we have one track from the ew album from Sydney's Crooked Fiddle Band, who are taking their gypsy/klezmer/folk roots and mixing them with a solid rock/postrock sensibility, aided & abetted here by the sympathetic ear of Steve Albini on production duties. It's raw yet accomplished, cohesive despite its varied inputs. One of the best local releases in some time and I'll definitely be playing more. And now we have a treat - the latest (and last) volume in Second Language's Music and Migration series is out, a third compilation of original music from this superlative English label, all about birds in the name of raising money for nature conservation organisation BirdLife International. But Opiate has brought us into more electronic waters, and we have to hear this next one right away - an incredible new Tricky remix from Andy Stott, perhaps Burial-esque, but in fact nothing less than Andy Stott-esque in its slow-growing minimalism. And that's it, we're then into our other mini-special for the evening - once a young upstart, now a don of the Warp label, none other than (Chris) Clark, who has just released a double remix album - mainly highlights from his own remixes, with a few remixes of him thrown in for good measure. Sarah Neufeld - You Are The Field [Constellation] Listen again — ~109MB
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Sunday, 15th of September, 2013
Playlist 15.09.13 (10:07 pm)
Couldn't have been a more varied show tonight, from the purest driven folk to black metal Americana drone to noise/techno/jungle to post-jazz glitch drone to indie math rock to post-rock! I guess. You know, whatever. LISTEN AGAIN via the link at the bottom, or stream on demand from FBi! Starting with the folk stylings of Sharron Kraus, with another of Second Language's beautifully-packaged "library series" CDs, complete with a bonus disc courtesy of my newly-minted subscription to the label! Kraus has roots in English and Appalachian folk songs, but the singing on this album is wordless, and indeed the song structures are repetitive and evolving rather than involving verses and choruses. It initially comes across as quite minimally constructed, but becomes quietly involving. Icelandic composer Ólafur Arnalds is in the country and playing at the Basement this Thursday and Friday. Oh... and I'm supporting him on Thursday if you wanna come along, m'kay? We heard a couple of his more electronic pieces, which I tend to find more compelling than the straight piano & strings classical stuff. I love the heavy beats of "til enda" backing up the strings, and the more minimal beats of "Endalaus II" with piano. And now we get to our special on the pretty incredible music of Jenks Miller aka Horseback. There's actually a lot I missed here, including his "solo" works, a new album of which is winging its way to me right now. But as Horseback (group and solo), he manages to cover a lot of ground, including the black metal-style screams that make up most of his vocals, and awesome riffage drawing from metal and punk, but along with that there's epic and beautiful drones and other sonic experimentation from the noise world, and a surprising influence from Americana - folk, blues and rock. It somehow all works and has resulted in some of the best experimental sounds in "metal" from the last half-decade (if you can get past those bloodcurdling vocals). Plus on this latest 3CD rarities compilation, there's a whole collection of tracks made from drum loops, organs and, well, less confronting vocals - a whole other direction. Making totally different music also drawing from noise is the mysterious duo Violetshaped. Their techno stylings owe a debt to industrial and extreme noise as well as to the usual electronic sources, and for their two remix EPs they've chosen some particularly great remixers, including the great post-dubstep noisester Roly Porter on the previous, and none other than Keith Fullerton Whitman on the latest, with a side-long epic of generative beats & textures. I didn't have time to play that, but another of my favourite artists ever also appears: Justin K Broadrick, here in his JK Flesh guise, with a heavy, slowed-down junglist rework which really hits the spot. And next, a sequence of artists related to Shoeb Ahmad's hellosQuare label. Melbourne new/post(?)-jazz group Motion have a couple of excellent albums out, but I only just acquired the remix disc, and it is fiiiiine. Especially this almost-black-metal remix by Shoeb Ahmad himself. Also present is the mix from Perth's Kynan Tan, and therein lies the connection, as Tan and Motion's Andrew Brooks make up new act Té, a very dark noise/drone act using the tortured sax of Brooks along with lots of electronics. We also heard another track from the brilliant Golden Blonde debut album, plus something from their previous incarnation as Kasha, released on hellosQuare. It's perhaps straighter math rock of a sort, but you can definitely hear the origins of their sound in there. Finally, some very lovely postrock out of Brisbane from Ghost Notes. Instrumental music, but with piano, trumpet and other instruments pushing it in jazz and folk directions. Highly recommended. Sharron Kraus - Cadair Idris [Second Language] Listen again — ~106MB
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Sunday, 8th of September, 2013
Playlist 08.09.13 (10:09 pm)
HAPPY TENTH BIRTHDAY FBI! LISTEN AGAIN as usual... Link on this post or stream on demand. We start with the latest from Four Tet, which might seem to further cement his new position in 4/4 techno - and indeed it is 4/4, but it's decidedly quirky. As befitting its title, a tribute to the London pirate radio station that was central to hardcore/jungle in the early '90s and is still broadcasting today, he liberally drops mashed-up amen breaks over the 4/4 beat, along with a hilarious and briefly terrifying vocal snippet. On the flipside, the "bliss mix" takes everything out except the high-pitched warble and a tiny bit of vocal sample, and lives up to its name. I know nothing of R.S.A.G. except they have an excellent acronym for a name (Rarely Seen Above Ground from their URL) and have been remixed by the always excellent Mr Dunk Murphy aka Sunken Foal. A nice bit of moody electronic pop with bouncy beats. Speaking of bouncy and electronic, Lorn is back on Ninja Tune with an EP that carries on from the rather dark outlook of his 2nd album (and debut on Ninja Tune). In amongst the very melodic synths and post-dubstep/wonky beats he has been scattering very organic sounds, to his benefit, and there are some quite tribal 6/8 beats appearing here too - he's always been a force unto himself, despite fitting in the scene around Flying Lotus (who released his first album) et al... Rory St John is a techno producer from Dublin, now based in Berlin. On this new EP he seems to take his sound in a more breakbeat/hardcore direction, harkening back to classic hardore in a way, and this impression can only be heightened by the presence of an excellent remix from DHR legend Christoph de Babalon. Next up, a series of tracks from Swedish composer & electronic musician Marcus Fjellström, on the occasion of his new album Epilogue -M-, which explores the very sci-fi sounds of his murky synthesisers. He's an accomplished composer for orchestra as well, but mostly tonight I focused on his electronic works, from some earlier albums as well. Somehow the 20th century feel of his sounds and compositional style sit very easily with contemporary trends. Oh, and speaking of soundtracks, our own Ben Frost (if he's willing to be called Australian any more, so long has he been resident in Iceland) has released 3 of his scores on his Bandcamp, which are replete with his famous growling sub-bass and electronic touches with classical and rock instrumentation. For those of us who've been waiting impatiently after the last two stellar albums, these are very welcome. I'm very happy to finally be able to play more than just the initial singles from Golden Blonde's debut album on Tenzenmen. Their previous incarnation as punkish math-rock band Kasha promised a lot, but what they've delivered here is far beyond expectations. The math-rock angularity is still there, but there's heaps of electronic processing and editing, disjointed vocals, surprising Grizzly Bear-like melodies, full-on crazy drumming and much more. Actually listening back to their 2009 EP five songs for sunstroke, a considerable amount of this was already present, but they've put everything into this album, mixed it up and let it mature. Top album. Keeping with pop out of left-field, Crackler is another project I'm finally able to play you. The work of Ollie Bown with Adem Ilhan of Fridge, it comes across as a more experimental Tunng. Or maybe a less skittery Icarus with vocals. In any case, you can download it all from Ollie Bown's Soundcloud and you should. Finally, one beautiful track from Kate Carr's new album on her own Flaming Pines label. Entitled Songs from a cold place, it incorporates evocative field recordings from her time in northern Iceland earlier this year with lonesome guitar recordings - although it's a lot more varied than you might think. This melding of field recordings and musical recordings is at the core of what Carr is doing with Flaming Pines, and this is a very fine example. Four Tet - Kool FM (Bliss mix) (under talking) [TEXT] Listen again — ~107MB
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Saturday, 7th of September, 2013
Ten albums (and a couple of cheats) from ten genres for ten years of FBi (and Utility Fog!) (12:45 am)
In celebration of ten years, I've done a list of ten things! Anyone who's listened to Utility Fog much during its ten years (so far) of existence will come away with at least a couple of impressions: 1) I have a love of obscure, quaintly specific, and let's face if often completely made-up genres (including UFog's very own portmanteau genre "postfolkrocktronica") and folktronica - The Lemon of Pink by The Books indietronica - Outside Closer / The Lost You EP by Hood postrock - One Time For All Time by 65daysofstatic breakcore - Rossz Csillag Alatt Született by Venetian Snares noise - Blood Lightning 2007 by Burning Star Core drone - Weleer by Machinefabriek alt.hop - The Weather by Busdriver & Radioinactive with Daedelus dubstep - City Limits Vol. 1 & 2 by Silkie idm/electronica - Exai by Autechre an insane mess of absolutely everything - Hurtbreak Wonderland by World's End Girlfriend
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email: utilityfog at frogworth dot com bsky Mastodon Utility Fog teeters on the cusp between acoustic and electronic, organic and digital. Constantly changing and rearranging, this aural cloud of nanotech consumes genres and spits them out in new forms. Whether cataloguing the jungle resurgence, tracking the ups and downs of noise and drone, or unearthing the remnants of glitch and folktronica, all is contextualised within artist & genre histories for a fulfilling sonic journey. Since all these genre names are already pretty ridiculous, we thought we'd coin a new one. So "postfolkrocktronica" it is. Wear it. Now available: free "Live on Utility Fog" downloads! We got tasty rss2 or atom feeds - get Utility Fog playlists in your favourite RSS reader/aggregator. There's also a dedicated podcast feed. Click here to subscribe in iTunes. Archives of all previous playlists and entries are available:
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