Tonight, new highlights from Origamibiro and Plaid, and some great remixes of Telafonica…
LISTEN AGAIN as usual via the link at the bottom, or the podcast, or FBi on Demand…

I wasn’t going to draw attention to the date at all tonight, but then Busdriver happened to post the excellent MC Paul Barman track on Facebook this evening, and it seemed like an appropriate start of the show.
Sticking with the hip-hop, we heard Sole at his polemic best, pressing philosopher Slavoj Zizek into service “collaborating” on this track.
The aforementioned Busdriver has formed a new project with Nocando as Flash Bang Grenada, and their new album is underground hip-hop at its finest. Regular collaborator Open Mike Eagle appears here.

The new Sole & the SkyRider Band is full of classic, catchy numbers, of which “We Will Not Be Moved” is a highlight. Not least of my motivations in playing it was so that I could showcase a couple of older SkyRider tunes — not the very oldest, but from 2008’s self-titled album, with some obvious contributions from William Ryan Fritch (whose string presence on the Sole track is also very strong), and then a great beat-oriented track from last year’s AUX SEND mixtape.

Telafonica are taking an interesting approach with their latest recording: a whole slew of remix releases will come out before the actual album and the original tracks can be heard. Viceroy is first cab off the rank, and the remixes are superlative. Option Command aka Broken Chip is in his wonky beats mode, as seen also on his recent EP (from which we heard a cut), while Scissor Lock turns in almost 10 minutes of dark, shuddering drone.

Deep and dark also is The Haxan Cloak, who we heard a couple of weeks ago. His rumbling cello mixes in perfectly with the percussion, electronics and drones. This is a hugely impressive record.
Another hugely impressive record in the drone vein comes from Canadian Damian Valles. The drones here are fleshed out with full arrangements and sometimes song structures, in a fashion which really feels like the future of this drone/sound art genre.

Sydney’s Kate Carr runs the Flaming Pines label, and has put out a couple of geography/weather inspired compilations recently, along with her own EP here. Beautifully recorded ambient guitar noise, field recordings and other sounds come together over 5 tracks. And from the Burning Palms compilation we have Darren McClure, who I don’t believe has ever visited the beach being evoked on the record, rather beautifully describes the “Figure 8” pond in music.

It’s been a while since we’ve heard from Origamibiro. As a solo act, Tom Hill (one half of idm duo Wauvenfold) put out a beautiful folktronic album in 2007. It’s my kind of folktronica – digital cut-ups and treatments of acoustic instruments. Now a duo (or trio with visuals), they’re releasing a stunning new album, and to preview it, a remix EP which you can download for free. We heard two remixes of “Quad Time”, one from the offthesky-related Juxta Phona and another from the fabulous Leafcutter John.

The delicate harpsichord-like sounds introducing the first track on Plaid’s new album follow on rather nicely from the preceding folktronica. But it’s vintage Plaid, this album, all the way through: perfect melodies, surprising harmonic progressions, bouncy beats and occasional weird time signatures.

A very electronic tune from the new HTRK followed, plus a reminder of the greatness of their previous album — apathetic yet dejected vocals, production that takes the best of post-punk into the current day.

Next, two tracks from Finnish Salli Lunn, Danish indie-metal band who’ve just released a most excellent remix disc, with influences from industrial and psychedelic music as well as electronica. Scott Solter goes pretty hard with his, in keeping with the source material. More next week! Very fine stuff, originals and remixes.

I did intend last week to play some Grandaddy, but ran out of time, so here we are this week — celebrating the Deluxe edition of their 2000 opus The Sophtware Slump, sprawling indie Americana with electronics and studio nonsense. The opening track is a recognized classic, sometimes recalling Pink Floyd, often (as Grandaddy do) recalling The Flaming Lips or Mercury Rev… On EP track “Our Dying Brains”, Jason Lytle recalls creating the vocal trickery through studio experimentation, no Pro Tools or anything being available — he recorded multiple vocal takes, and dropped in different versions throughout the chorus, to memorable robotic effect.

Finally, it can’t be a UFog at the moment without Animals on Wheels. He’s up to number 7 of his 8 EPs in 8 Weeks, this one including some jazzy beats and tasteful piano. The whole thing is going to add up to something pretty damn impressive.

MC Paul Barman – Happy September 11th [download here]
Sole – Living In The End Times (w/ Slavoj Zizek) [free download from Soleone]
Flash Bang Grenada (Busdriver & Nocando) – In A Perfect World (feat. Open Mike Eagle, prod Mono/Poly) [Hellfyre Club]
Sole & the SkyRider Band – We Will Not Be Moved (feat. Ceschi & Noah23) [Fake Four/Equinox Records]
SkyRider – SkyRider’s Theme [self-released]
SkyRider – aux send 1a [self-released]
Telafonica – Viceroy (Option Command version) [available from Bandcamp]
Option Command – Polybell Strategy [King Deluxe]
Telafonica – Viceroy (Scissor Lock version) [available from Bandcamp]
The Haxan Cloak – Burning Torches of Despair [Aurora Borealis]
Damian Valles – Bones Made Out Of Bone [Drifting Falling]
The Haxan Cloak – The Growing [Aurora Borealis]
Damian Valles – Calavera [Drifting Falling]
Kate Carr – Saturday night [Flaming Pines]
Darren McClure – Figure 8 [Flaming Pines]
Kate Carr – A choir full of longing [Flaming Pines]
Origamibiro – Dismantle Piece [Denizen/Abandon Building Recordings]
Origamibiro – Quad Time (Juxta Phona Remix) [Denizen/Abandon Building Recordings] {free download remix EP}
Origamibiro – Quad Time (Leafcutter John Remix) [Denizen/Abandon Building Recordings] {free download remix EP}
Origamibiro – Nootaikok [Denizen/Abandon Building Recordings]
Plaid – missing [Warp]
Plaid – Little People [Warp]
Plaid – eye robot [Warp]
HTRK – Work That Body [BLAST First (petite)/Ghostly/Mistletone]
HTRK – Fascinator [BLAST First (petite)]
Salli Lunn – Mirror Girl (Scott Solter remix) [Hidden Shoal]
Salli Lunn – The Frame of Reference [Hidden Shoal]
Grandaddy – He’s Simple, He’s Dumb, He’s The Pilot [Mercury/Universal]
Grandaddy – Our Dying Brains [Mercury/Universal]
Animals on Wheels – Formality [free download from Animals on Wheels]

Listen again — ~ 159MB

Evening! Jam-packed show tonight as usual, and an interview with the lovely Jochen of Hinterlandt.
LISTEN AGAIN via the usual methods (link at bottom of playlist; podcast feed; FBi on Demand streaming).

Started with two tracks from Roll The Dice, whose new album is coming out soon on the Leaf label, and is a perfect continuation from their debut on Digitalis — analogue synth explorations and (acoustic) piano, krautrock updated for today’s ears.

After a stint in Australia earlier last decade, German musician Hinterlandt is back in Sydney in a more permanent manner. Last time round he convened an experimental collective for improv performances under the name Hinterlandt Arkestra; for now, his new incarnation is Jochen solo, playing a multitude of instruments and effects pedals to create an incredibly varied, genre-hopping one-man show. After performing and evolving this set over the last year or so, he’s put it down on disc as migration motion movement. We chatted about his travels & his musical modus operandi, and heard a wonderful ambient rendering of part of the set.
Hinterlandt is launching this album this Friday the 9th of September and Midian, 19 Sydney St, Marrickville.

Next up, I just had to feature some of the music of Kashiwa Diasuke, who’s associated with one of my favourite artists ever, World’s End Girlfriend (his latest album is released on WEG’s label Virgin Babylon), but who I managed to remain ignorant of until very recently. He’s fond of glitchy cut-ups, insane changes of mood, post-classical piano and crazed drill’n’bass beats, much like WEG — pretty much my ideal music. We heard a decent range of his music from the last 6 years, although sadly the program music I album had to be left out as its tracks are 36 and 26 minutes long (eek!)

Like two of Kashiwa Daisuke’s abums, yarn:moor are released on the fabulous Noble label. I discovered them through my usual habit of trying to add more to my shopping cart when order from Noble, and they seemed pretty good. It turns out that’s an understatement — this is quality folktronica, with detailed programming, fun effects, cute Japanese vocals and, you know, all that. You should check them out.

Sticking with Japan, a beautiful release from Preco Records from a new supergroup of sorts, Kinder Scout. The central players are cellist Danny Norbury, Home Normal‘s Ian Hawgood and Jason Corder of offthesky and Color Cassette. Strings, drones, folky guitars, dreamy backgrounded vocals, it’s all here.

Speaking of all that, how about a gorgeous exclusive new track from Peter Broderick from moss, a compilation on new Japanese label cote labo.

Broken Chip hails from the Blue Mountains and has released some very pretty electronica on Feral Media and elsewhere. Under this name he’s creating some beautiful more droney stuff, such as the track from Flaming Pines‘ burning palms compilation, put together by Sydney artist Kate Carr.
He’s now created the Option Command alias for his more contemporary beat-driven stuff, in keeping with Sydney’s ONEOFOUR Collective, or the LA sound — including the tendency towards really short tracks! Short & sweet, this is a very fine EP.

Also recently discovered is duo Kritical Audio, whose latest EP is on Detroit Underground, with a highly technical take on idm, frenetic drum’n’bass breaks over a half-speed, in the style of some of the best US idm artists of 10 or so years ago (e.g. Unit). There’ll always be a place in my heart for this sort of stuff.

On one of Rjyan Kidwell’s first Cex albums there’s a remix of Washington, DC indiepunk band Dismemberment Plan. It seems a few years later when they were breaking up, Kidwell made another remix, but it was never released. You can now download it from his Cexman SoundCloud, dedicated to remixes. It’s got more guitars than the other one :) Classic Cex feel.

Back in the ’90s, beatsystem had some releases on the well-loved ambient electronic label em:t. It’s a bit of a surprise to get a new album from him now, with some pretty special packaging (really – check it out at the bottom of this page). Here he takes on a digitally processed trip around the Indian subcontinent, starting with an alien robot performing the tabla bol (a vocal rendering of the tabla sounds, familiar to anyone who’s studied complex & beautiful music of India).

Of course, another Animals on Wheels track this week, from the 6th in his series of 8 EPs. I think this was the only track with beats. When all 8 EPs are done (two more weeks!) I’ll do an overview of all the EPs. It’s been fun!

Melbourne’s doomy indie HTRK trio have managed to move on from the tragic death of their bassist Sean Stewart last year, and their new album continues with minimalist, hard-hitting, nostalgic yet cutting edge sounds. They’ve never been as noisy as their first, originally self-released EP, but they’re no less uncompromising for it.

Finally, ex-New Zealand, ex-Sydney harp/songwriter Heidi Elva is releasing an album of Lo-Fi Musings, a collection of songs written mainly while in Sydney, technology-based, yet lo-fi in sound. Delays and loops abound, vocals sung through pickups, field recordings washing in and out. Beautiful stuff from an always experimental song-writer.

Roll The Dice – Way Out [Leaf]
Roll The Dice – Axee [Digitalis]
Hinterlandt – motion [Tenzenmen/Bird’s Robe Collective] {also available along with more of his back catalogue from the Hinterlandt Bandcamp}
…interview with Hinterlandt and live performance of section of “migration”…
Kashiwa Diasuke – airdrop [onpa)))))]
Kashiwa Diasuke – Good-bye [Virgin Babylon]
Kashiwa Diasuke – rabbit’s_quartet [onpa)))))]
Kashiwa Diasuke – april.#09 (Jean-Michel remix) [onpa)))))]
Kashiwa Diasuke – Requiem [Noble]
yarn:moor – it’s blooming [Noble]
yarn:moor – 1014 [Noble]
Kinder Scout – first half [Preco Records]
Peter Broderick – Missing People [cote labo]
Broken Chip – Path to the sea [Flaming Pines]
Option Command – Ellie Can Dance [King Deluxe]
Option Command – Hidden Valleys [King Deluxe]
Kritical Audio – Katacomb [Detroit Underground]
Cex – Sunken city (remix of Dismemberment Plan) [available from SoundCloud]
beatsystem – bangalore [entropy records]
Animals on Wheels – Stair Nose [free download from Animals on Wheels blog]
HTRK – Bending [BLAST First (petite)/Ghostly/Mistletone]
HTRK – Hate Rock Trio [Fire Records]
Heidi Elva – Simple Pleasures [forthcoming through her Bandcamp]

Listen again — ~ 159MB

So much great music for you tonight! Also interview later with William Ryan Fritch aka Vieo Abiungo.
As usual, LISTEN AGAIN via the link at bottom of playlist, or subscribe to the podcast — you can also stream it on demand (best option if you’ll be listening while online). The interview starts about an hour in…

I only got to play one track from the new collaboration between alt.hip-hop heroes Busdriver & Nocando as Flash Bang Grenada — more next week, but rather nice to hear Busdriver doing a great production himself on this number…
Later this evening, an in-depth interview with William Ryan Fritch. Here I played an interesting track featuring his vocals and a chopped beat that’s almost James Blake-like.

The new Beirut album is out — and it sounds like Beirut! The familiar impassioned vocals and trumpet of Zach Condon, with his winds and brass. It sags a bit in the middle, I find, with some slower piano-based numbers, but along with the first few, the last track is another classic.
It reminded me a little of the beautiful b-side to the Elephant Gun 7″ from 2007, “Transatlantique” – probably my favourite Beirut tune.

Ryan Lott’s Son Lux seemed a weird fit for the Anticon label when his first album came out, but perhaps because Anticon’s such a wide umbrella now, now it just seems like a thing. Fair enough. This new album was recorded over the course of one month — a process that can be tracked on NPR’s blog (here’s the last post, with links to the others). It’s a pretty fantastic mix of his orchestral arrangements, electronic production, and pure singing — pretty much what made his first album so striking as well! In between the two albums was a digital-only EP of remixes and new versions of the track “Weapons”, and I played the remix by composer Nico Muhly.

Sydney’s Oliver Tank has been making some pretty impressive sounds this year, and I’ve finally twigged to his sound. We heard some strings in there with the post-___ beats and singing. Check out his SoundCloud for more!

And then a long conversation with the lovely William Ryan Fritch: film composer, sound designer, recording world/folk as Vieo Abiungo, and also a member of underground hip-hop band Sole & the SkyRider Band. We talked about all aspects of his music, and underneath the interview I played an unlistable number of his tracks. Afterwards, the most beautiful melodic track from his latest album, which happens to be the title track, “and the world is still yawning”, followed by his selection from the new Sole & the SkyRider Band album.

We followed with some more cello! So many people doing great things with my chosen instrument at the moment. The Haxan Cloak is Bobby Krlic, playing cello, percussion, electronics and various home-made instruments. His album has wonderful layers of doom-laden close-mic’d cello, along with percussion, or long drone pieces, and occasionally some rhythms approaching beats. Thus it was very strange when his recent 12″ appeared and it was like some Druidic techno rave… I only just got the album and it’s pretty damn great.

Equally great is the new album from Stockholm, Sweden’s Roll The Dice, out on Leaf shortly. I discovered them last year via the wonderful Digitalis label. The new disc continues in very much the same vein, krautrocky analogue synthesiser patterns rubbing up (on some tracks) against the percussive (acoustic) piano. It works thrillingly well, as we heard tonight in particular with the closing track of their new disc, “See You Monday”. Sweet.

Now let’s really get into classical/electronic crossover, courtesy of Sydney’s Mannheim Rocket, who is named for a particular technique of rising arpeggiated patterns in classical music. His choice of samples comes from a bit further down the track, though, in the early 20th century, with the great Dmitri Shostakovich. Snippets of orchestral and vocal music are chopped and looped over industrial-sounding bass music — it’s effective, and should be a sign of great things to come.

From Melbourne we heard a couple of tracks from Paul Heslin, who’s channeling Matmos with a track entirely based on samples from his shower… plus an excellent cut from an EP from last year you can find on his Bandcamp.

Another Melbourne artist who’s just joined the Bandcamp generation is part timer. As well as a couple of hard-to-find EPs, he’s got a collection of bits and pieces, from which we heard the beautifully low-key “five pillars”.

And yes, one track from the 5th in Animals on Wheels’s series of 8 EPs in 8 Weeks. The beats are more of a downtempo nature on this one, and it’s nice hearing the piano in there on this track…

Finally, Melbourne’s I’lls’ make another appearance from their excellent debut — electronic production, shoegazey songwriting, very lovely.

Flash Bang Grenada (Busdriver & Nocando) – Bernie [Hellfyre Club]
Autechre – 6852 [free with ATP event ticket]
vieo abiungo – suffocating skin [Lost Tribe Sound] {via the Lost Tribe Sound mailing list…}
Beirut – Port Of Call [Pompeii]
Beirut – Transatlantique [4AD]
Son Lux – Leave The Riches [Anticon]
Tank – Last night I heard everything in slow motion [download from Triple J Unearthed]
Son Lux – Weapons IV (Nico Muhly remix) [Anticon]
Son Lux – Raise [Anticon]
Son Lux – Claws [Anticon]
vieo abiungo – drowsy salted morning [Lost Tribe Sound]
…interview with William Ryan Fritch…
vieo abiungo – and the world is still yawning [Lost Tribe Sound]
Sole & the SkyRider Band – Bad Captain Swag (feat. Lil B & Pictureplane) [Fake Four/Equinox Records]
The Haxan Cloak – Raven’s Lament [Aurora Borealis]
The Haxan Cloak – Hounfour [Aurora Borealis]
Roll The Dice – Idle Hands [Leaf]
Roll The Dice – Into The Ground [Digitalis]
Roll The Dice – See You Monday [Leaf]
Mannheim Rocket – De Profundis [3BS Records]
Paul Heslin – Shower [available from SoundCloud]
Mannheim Rocket – Lorelei [3BS Records]
part timer – five pillars [download from part timer Bandcamp]
Paul Heslin – television is a poor subtitute for a lover [available from SoundCloud]
Animals on Wheels – Double [free download from Animals on Wheels website]
I’lls’ – When I Know [available from Bandcamp]

Listen again — ~ 157MB

Evening! After a huge weekend rehearsing and performing at the Graphic Festival, I’m in the mood for some radio. Lucky I’m doing 3 hours for you as usual tonight hey!
I had the honour of playing strings with Plaid, and I’m going to play faves from their back catalogue tonight, in amongst the slews of new stuff…
LISTEN AGAIN – link at bottom of playlist, podcast also available, and you can also stream it on demand (best option if you’ll be listening while online).

Canberra’s Reuben Ingall starts the show with his live-glitched guitar and vocals. It’s very impressive to hear these tracks demonstrating how great he is at processing his guitar live, while still crafting great indie songs. More of this kind of thing, please.
William Ryan Fritch is unstoppable, and proves it this week by releasing an entire album of b-sides from his Vieo Abiungo project a week and a half before the new album comes out (along with a remix disc), and only a year or so since the first album — while he’s also been part of SkyRider Band (see later in the show).
The b-sides/outtakes are all good enough to have appeared on the album proper too!

Pete Swanson hasn’t slowed down since the breakup of the Yellow Swans. His new EP is available digitally and encompasses three beautiful noisy drone tracks, although there’s more detail in the arrangements here than straight drone.
And from a few years back, I played a solo track by the other half of Yellow Swans as well, GMS.

Animals on Wheels continues to impress with his 8 EPs in 8 Weeks. Number 4 is very varied, and mostly quite unlike what we might have come to expect from him. More like his Andrew Coleman stuff, it still surprises with a piece of shoegazey electric guitar rock, among other things. Highly recommended (and free! Go get it now!)

After that AoW track it’s only appropriate that we go to Seattle-based shoegaze duo Golden Gardens, with a track from their forthcoming album. It’s very much early-’90s-style shoegaze, with a few electronic updates, and nicely done.

Although shoegaze is part of their sound, Melbourne’s I’lls’ have a strong electronic element in the studio edits, as well as some nice heavy bass moments. Their Threads EP is available now on Bandcamp and is the recommendation of the week.

Then off we went into the Plaid special, witnessing just how much blissful emotion they can infuse into their electronica — including the 1995 track from when they were still 2/3 of The Black Dog.
Mara Carlyle used to be married to Andy from Plaid, and she sang on most of their earlier albums. This track, from her exquisite 2004 album The Lovely, is a reworking for strings of a hidden track from Plaid’s Rest Proof Clockwork album.

After another forthcoming Golden Gardens track we heard a newie from Balam Acab, plus the track that put him on the map. I haven’t gotten on board with Balam Acab as much as with, say, Clams Casino, and a lot of the new album leans too much towards the r’n’b side of his samples for my taste. Still, he’s onto something pretty special, no doubt.

I was shocked (shocked, I say!) to discover this week that two new Autechre tracks came out recently and slipped under my radar. The one I played came from a 76-track (ouch) Japan benefit compilation with a few special appearances such as Ae, and it’s a sortof abrasive sped-up electro thing. There’s another which was given away with tickets to an ATP in the UK. I’ve tracked it down and I’ll probably play it next week.

Sydney postrock gods (hehe) Underlapper have released a free Bandcamp single with a few new tracks. FBi’s own Loopsnake does a sterling job, as to Telafonica (sounds like a job for next week’s playlist!)

Speaking of remixes, how about Australia’s current #1 single from Gotye? Pretty amazing piece of perfect pop, hey? Tim Shiel aka Faux Pas emailed around his radical reworking earlier this week, and I don’t think it’s available to the general public in completed form yet, so there you go!
His album also isn’t officially out, but was available at his Graphic gigs this weekend. I played a low-key dubby electronic song, and then the awesome chopped-up vocal layered “The Only Way” from his previous album.

Speaking of perfect pop and ultra-tweaked/chopped drums, how about a stone cold classic from 10 years ago courtesy Funkstörung mit Jay-Jay Johanson? Yes. There’s always room for this song in any playlist, ever.

There is also always room for Luke Vibert, surely. I almost tweeted during this song “Everybody likes Luke Vibert”, but it probably would have distressed those who are already bemused by 2/3 of what I tweet. But everybody does love Luke Vibert, right? This is an exclusive from that Japan benefit, so get on it, peeps! Head-nodding sample-heavy hip-hop done right.

We hear again from Sole & the SkyRider Band’s surprisingly poppy new album Hello Cruel World. Here he’s joined by underground hip-hop superstar Lil B & electronic musician Pictureplane. I cannot recommend highly enough this brilliant refix by SkyRider of the entire album, in post-dubstep/glitch-hop fashion.

Machinedrum’s Room(s) is one of the best dance music releases in recent memory. I thought we should hear a bit more of his past, and we can see what a contemporary he was of early Prefuse 73, with fusion glitch-hop plus more folktronic sounds as tstewart.

To finish up, two more sedate Aussie tracks — another newie from Reuben Ingall, and my fave from the new Anonymeye album.

Reuben Ingall – dog/dogs [free download from Bandcamp]
vieo abiungo – drowsy salted morning [Lost Tribe Sound]
vieo abiungo – cold clotted limbs [vieo.albm.fm] {free b-sides download album for an email!}
Pete Swanson – Cocktail Champion [three lobed recordings]
GMS – Hollow and Full [Red 76/Bootylegs]
Animals on Wheels – Finally Dumb [free download from Animals on Wheels]
Animals on Wheels – Indeed [free download from Animals on Wheels]
Golden Gardens – The Empress [forthcoming via Bandcamp]
I’lls’ – Take Higher Ground [available from Bandcamp]
I’lls’ – To Not Second Guess Oneself [available from Bandcamp]
Plaid – Eyen [Warp]
The Black Dog – Chesh [Warp]
Plaid – Shackbu [Warp]
Mara Carlyle – It’s Time [Accidental Records]
Golden Gardens – Shimmerine [forthcoming via Bandcamp]
Balam Acab – Fragile Hope [Tri-Angle]
Balam Acab – See Birds (Moon) [Tri-Angle]
Autechre – Ts1a [ICASEA] {available from Bandcamp}
Underlapper – Those Six Skeletons (Loopsnake remix) [Feral Media] {free download from Bandcamp}
Gotye – Somebody That I Used To Know (feat. Kimbra) (Faux Pas remix) [direct from Faux Pas… not sure where you’ll be able to get it!]
Gotye – Don’t Worry We’ll Be Watching You [Eleven]
Gotye – The Only Way [self-released]
Funkstörung mit Jay-Jay Johanson – I Want Some Fun [Studio !K7]
Luke Vibert – Childance [ICASEA] {available from Bandcamp}
Sole & the SkyRider Band – Bad Captain Swag (feat. Lil B & Pictureplane) [Fake Four/Equinox Records]
Machinedrum – U Don’t Survive [Planet µ]
Machinedrum – Half The Battle [Merck]
tstewart – jess [Merck]
Reuben Ingall – fog [free download from Bandcamp]
Anonymeye – Meritocracy [Someone Good]

Listen again — ~ 160MB