Electronic sounds of many varieties and provenances tonight, from idm to ambient to cut-up collage, alongside hip-hop/noise/free jazz, Bantu-Kongolese techno, and even some solo cello.
LISTEN AGAIN for your edjamacation, by streaming online at FBi Radio, or podcasting here.
Mira Calix – rightclick [Warp]
Mira Calix – Sandsings (Boards of Canada remix) [Warp]
Mira Calix with Oliver Coates – In A Beautiful Place Out In The Country [Warp]
Mira Calix – just go along [Warp]
Chantal Passamonte aka Mira Calix has a long association with idm and electronic music, having been one of the few female artists associated with the scene in the 1990s, and not only signed to Warp but working as their publicist for some years. In 2003 she first collaborated with the London Sinfonietta, and her talent for working with classical musicians has since resulted in numerous commissions and creative works – tonight we heard her stunning cover of Boards of Canada from Warp’s 20th anniversary compilation series (and before that, we jumped back to 1998, with her second EP on which BoC contributed a classic remix). Calix’s new EP brings her back to the idm world with some sweet beats, embedded with the field recordings and organic sounds she now typically works with.
Martina Lussi – Classic Intense [Latency/Bandcamp]
Martina Lussi – Citrin [Hallow Ground/Bandcamp]
Martina Lussi – Anarchy For Her [Latency/Bandcamp]
Based in Lucerne, Switzerland, Martina Lussi has just released her second album, and while the first, 2017’s Selected Ambient, was excellent, this new one is a further step forward. On Diffusion is a Force Lussi concerns herself with the fragmented, disconnected nature of the contemporary world, melding electric guitar, electric piano, field recordings, spoken samples, and occasional nods and techno/electronica and industrial distortion. Fantastic stuff.
Anatole – Medlow Bath [Mercury Kx]
Sydney’s Jonathan Baker is gearing up for his new album Emulsion to be released on Decca‘s Mercury Kx label. This single is a reference to his original home in the Blue Mountains, produced in his classical-meets-electronica way. The album’s a couple of months away yet, so hopefully there’s another single in a bit!
Brent Arnold – Esoteric Etude #1 for solo cello [Bandcamp]
Lovely single track just released from Filastine collaborator Brent Arnold, showing what can be done with a cello and no processing or looping.
Anguish – Vibrations [RareNoise Records]
Anguish – Cyclical / Physical [RareNoise Records]
This is what can only be described as a super-group. Anguish is a collaboration between two members of industrial hip-hop pioneers dälek (Will Brooks and Mike Mare), two members of Fire (Mats Gustafsson and Andreas Werliin) and Hans-Joachim Irmler of krautrock pioneers Faust. It’s a heavyweight team-up – dälek and Faust have already released an album together about 10 years ago, but the addition of Gustafsson & Werlin’s sax and drums contributes a lot to the, well, anguish in the proceedings.
Black To Comm – Lethe [Thrill Jockey/Bandcamp]
Black To Comm – Fly on you [Thrill Jockey/Bandcamp]
Jemh Circs – Ordre [Cellule 75]
Jemh Circs – 000 [Cellule 75]
Black To Comm – The Courtesan Jigokudayū Sees Herself as a Skeleton in the Mirror of Hell [Thrill Jockey/Bandcamp]
I’ve been aware of Marc Richter’s work as Black To Comm for some time, and I know he never tends to do exactly the same thing on each album, but it was only when he adopted the moniker Jemh Circs for a couple of releases a few years ago that I really paid attention. Those releases, sampling voices and pop music from YouTube, were an interesting detour into vaporwave, a little more hyperactive and day-glo than his Black To Comm work, which has itself taken on many forms in the past, sometimes minimalism & drone, often collage-based constructions. The new album Seven Horses For Seven Kings is a rather dark and heavy affair, well suited to Thrill Jockey‘s current sound, and I’ve been finding it absolutely absorbing. Drawing from collage and sampling techniques across the board from tape experiments, hip-hop instrumentals through to glitchscapes, it’s a mature and accomplished release.
Glyn Hendry – Escape Club 99 [Poly Kicks]
Described only as “newcomer Glyn Hendry“, and with no SoundCloud presence I can find, newcomer Glyn Hendry has released an excellent debut 12” on Overmono‘s Poly Kicks label. Evolving breakbeats and a general rave aura make for two really fun sides.
Nkisi – VI [UIQ/Bandcamp]
Nkisi – VII [UIQ/Bandcamp]
One of the main architects of the NON Worldwide collective/label of African and diaspora artists, alongside Chino Amobi and Angel-Ho, Nkisi has just released her first full album through Lee Gamble’s extraordinary UIQ label. Drawing from the African Cosmology of the Bantu-Kongo, the album wonderfully mixes the polyrhythms of Congolese percussion music with evocative and pounding techno. It’s lovely hearing the melodic and mournful synth tones weaving in and out of the percussion and beats. A special album.
Funkmeister G – Stretches of Pain [Newtown Neighbourhood Centre/Bandcamp]
Here’s a really interesting project, put together at Newtown Neighbourhood Centre – a compilation called Buzzing Minds | A Sydney Noise Compilation for which a group of people who have experienced or are experiencing homelessness, many of them suffering mental and physical health issues, have produced raw, passionate and unquestionably experimental noise tracks. A few of the artists, including tonight’s, do have experience creating music – others are just putting themselves down on the recordings. The results can be challenging, but they’re worthwhile as a listener as well as for the fact of the creative acts involved. More info can be found here.
Listen again — ~201MB
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