FELDMAN, MORTON Last Pieces (Sub Rosa) cd 14.98

FELDMAN, MORTON Patterns In a Chromatic Field (Tzadik) cd 16.98
Feldman is easily one of our favorite modern composers, attacking space and decay in a similar way as do many of our favorite drone artists and electronic minimalists, focusing not on the attack of a note but the various sonic colorations and permutations the note goes through as it slowly slips away. In the same way, Feldman composes with space as much as he does with sound. Very dark and meditative, dreamy and otherworldy, but somehow also quite personal and romantic. "Patterns..." has many of those obvious Feldman elements but is much more dynamic and jagged than many of his other pieces. The drifting ambient parts definitely harken back to one of our all time favorite Feldman pieces "Rothko Chapel". But unlike the calm and meditative tranquility of "Rothko Chapel", "Patterns" is peppered with jagged atonal piano and squeaking cello. While for some it will obviously detract a bit from the overall mellow moodiness, but as a whole it adds another element of tension and almost aggression, before it slips back into slowly unfolding sweetly intimate quietude.
MPEG Stream: "Patterns In A Chromatic Field"

FELDMAN, MORTON Piano And String Quartet (Hat Hut) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
As far as I know this is the only the second time this piece by Feldman has been recorded -- the first by the Kronos Quartet with Aki Takahashi on Elektra -- but I could be wrong. Composed in 1985, Piano & String Quartet comes late in Feldman's career. Like other pieces of this period, this piece is quite lengthy, clocking in at over 70 minutes (the good people at Hat Hut have even put in arbitrary track numbers throughout the piece, just in case you can't finish it all in one sitting.) For those who found the 4 cd "For Philip Guston" a bit extreme of a commitment, this single disc might be a better introduction to Feldman's large scale works.
RealAudio clip: "Piano & String Quartet"

FELDMAN, MORTON Rothko Chapel Why Patterns? (New Albion) cd 13.98
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FELDMAN, MORTON String Quartet (II) (Hat Hut) 4cd 34.00
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FELDMAN, MORTON String Quartet No. 2 (Mode) dvd 38.00
In 1893 composer/prankster Erik Satie wrote a short piece for piano called "Vexations". Though the score fits easily on one page and is simple enough for even the the most novice of pianists (once they get over the note "spelling" jokes peppered within) to perform, the piece was never played in its entirety -- as the composer indicated -- until 1963. This was due to the performance instructions provided by Satie that the piece be repeated a mere 840 times, a command that would extend the length of the piece to well over an entire day -- give or take a few hours depending on one's tempo. Seventy years later John Cage and several friends, working in shifts, managed to complete it in a brief 17 hours. While Satie's intentions may have been of a humorously philosophical nature, the following century would see a veritable pissing match of composers writing longer and longer symphonies for bigger and bigger orchestras. While Morton Feldman would most certainly never be confused with the likes of grandpa Mahler, he had an ever exceding tendency for maximilizing the minimalism of his later works. We saw not long ago here at Aquarius the release of his 4 hour marathon "For Philip Guston". In a country where, with every passing year, A.D.D. is less a condition than the norm, Feldman's large scale works such as this exist as an anomaly. Webern's brief atonal morsels of the early 20th century seem more fitting to our current temperment. Feldman's later compositions are not only unrealistic for concert performance -- world premiers aside, they won't be entering the short list of the performance canon any time soon. At times the raison d'etre of these pieces seems to be more of an ascetic exercise for aspiring young performers. This performance of String Quartet No. 2, clocking in at a little over 6 hours, is a true test of a musician's endurance. A whole new set of preparations are to be taken into consideration, not the least of which is how to deal with nature's eventual call. And you can bet that prestigious, well paid string quartets like Arditti are not likely to be found cooped up in a studio for something like this. No, this is for young bucks paying their dues. While prestigious in their own rite, having played around the globe at numerous festivals to acclaim, the photo on the inside of this package of the Flux Quartet shows four young -- most certainly recently graduated from fine conservatories -- musicians with smiles on their faces (presumably this was before their non-stop performance of the piece). And while the continuing dedication of performers willing to endure such suffering is certainly a testament to the importance of Morton Feldman as one of the great composers of the late 20th century, it has still taken technology a little more time to catch up. While a single compact disc is good enough to hold the entirety of Beethoven's 9th symphony, it falls way short of handling the behemoths penned by Mr. Feldman. "For Philip Guston" which needs to be chopped up and spread out over 4 CDs would have necessitated 10 LPs back in 1984 and "String Quartet No. 2" exceeds Guston by two hours. Enter the DVD. With its ridiculous storage capacity, a single DVD can retain even the longest of compositions. You can put on "String Quartet No. 2" as you sit down for lunch and be finished as you sit down for dinner. For those of you *still* without a DVD player in this day and age, all is not lost. This edition also comes in the traditional CD form and it takes up a mere 5 discs. Don't worry, Feldman wouldn't begrudge you to listen to this piecemeal. His expectations of the listener are much less than that of the performer (and you can read all you want into his opinions on both) and he would probably encourage you to approach it in much the same way as one would approach a painting in a museum. Or maybe, as Satie might have wished, an elegant piece of furniture.
RealAudio clip: "String Quartet No. 2 [excerpt 1]"
RealAudio clip: "String Quartet No. 2 [excerpt 2]"

FELDMAN, MORTON String Quartet No. 2 (Mode) 5cd 60.00
In 1893 composer/prankster Erik Satie wrote a short piece for piano called "Vexations". Though the score fits easily on one page and is simple enough for even the the most novice of pianists (once they get over the note "spelling" jokes peppered within) to perform, the piece was never played in its entirety -- as the composer indicated -- until 1963. This was due to the performance instructions provided by Satie that the piece be repeated a mere 840 times, a command that would extend the length of the piece to well over an entire day -- give or take a few hours depending on one's tempo. Seventy years later John Cage and several friends, working in shifts, managed to complete it in a brief 17 hours. While Satie's intentions may have been of a humorously philosophical nature, the following century would see a veritable pissing match of composers writing longer and longer symphonies for bigger and bigger orchestras. While Morton Feldman would most certainly never be confused with the likes of grandpa Mahler, he had an ever exceding tendency for maximilizing the minimalism of his later works. We saw not long ago here at Aquarius the release of his 4 hour marathon "For Philip Guston". In a country where, with every passing year, A.D.D. is less a rare condition than the norm, Feldman's large scale works such as this exist as an anomaly. Webern's brief atonal morsels of the early 20th century seem more fitting to our current temperment. Feldman's later compositions are not only unrealistic for concert performance -- world premiers aside, they won't be entering the short list of the performance canon any time soon. At times the raison d'etre of these pieces seems to be more of an ascetic exercise for aspiring young performers. This performance of String Quartet No. 2, clocking in at a little over 6 hours, is a true test of a musician's endurance. A whole new set of preparations are to be taken into consideration, not the least of which is how to deal with nature's eventual call. And you can bet that prestigious, well paid string quartets like Arditti are not likely to be found cooped up in a studio for something like this. No, this is for young bucks paying their dues. While prestigious in their own rite, having played around the globe at numerous festivals to acclaim, the photo on the inside of this package of the Flux Quartet shows four young -- most certainly recently graduated from fine conservatories -- musicians with smiles on their faces (presumably this was before their non-stop performance of the piece). And while the continuing dedication of performers willing to endure such suffering is certainly a testament to the importance of Morton Feldman as one of the great composers of the late 20th century, it has still taken technology a little more time to catch up. While a single compact disc is good enough to hold the entirety of Beethoven's 9th symphony, it falls way short of handling the behemoths penned by Mr. Feldman. "For Philip Guston" which needs to be chopped up and spread out over 4 CDs would have necessitated 10 LPs back in 1984 and "String Quartet No. 2" exceeds Guston by two hours. Enter the DVD. With its ridiculous storage capacity, a single DVD can retain even the longest of compositions. You can put on "String Quartet No. 2" as you sit down for lunch and be finished as you sit down for dinner. For those of you *still* without a DVD player in this day and age, all is not lost. This edition also comes in the traditional CD form and it takes up a mere 5 discs. Don't worry, Feldman wouldn't begrudge you to listen to this piecemeal. His expectations of the listener are much less than that of the performer (and you can read all you want into his opinions on both) and he would probably encourage you to approach it in much the same way as one would approach a painting in a museum. Or maybe, as Satie might have wished, an elegant piece of furniture.
RealAudio clip: "String Quartet No. 2 [excerpt 1]"
RealAudio clip: "String Quartet No. 2 [excerpt 2]"

FELDMAN, MORTON The Viola In My Life (New World) cd 16.98

FELDMAN, MORTON Triadic Memories (Mode) 2cd 27.00

FELDMAN, MORTON Triadic Memories (Mode) dvd 30.00

FELDMAN, MORTON Turfan Fragments / For Samuel Beckett (Dog W/A Bone) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
The iconoclastic 20th Century composer Morton Feldman had been quite vocal in his disdain of traditional opera, making his historic collaborations throughout the '80s with author Samuel Beckett all the more idiosyncratic. Nevertheless, as the two embarked on several projects (such as the libretto "Neither") and began to delve into each other's works, it became apparant to Feldman that they in fact had quite a lot in common, as Feldman explains in the liner notes, his thoughts when composing his tribute to his friend Beckett: "Finally I see that every line is really the same thought said in another way. And yet the continuity acts as if something else is happening. Nothing else is happening. What you're doing, in an almost Proustian way, is getting deeper and deeper saturated into the thought." That is a very apt description of how Feldman's "For Samuel Beckett" sounds (perhaps my - Jim's - favorite composition from Feldman). For nearly an hour, Feldman slowly unfolds a captivating series of chord progressions which continuously reveal profoundly diverse variations in a very reductivist set of muted instruments and flat tones. For as much space that Feldman places between these eerie repititions, it's always surprising how dissonant they are, making what on the surface appears as a meditation on just slightly asymetrical tonal patterns, more of a suspension of the boundary between motion and stasis, tonality and atonality. "For Samuel Beckett" was the final composition that Feldman completed before his death in 1987.
"Turfan Fragments" was a composition dating seven years earlier, relating to a collection of 9th Century Chinese calligraphic fragments housed in Berlin's Preussicher Kulturbesitz. Compared to the lugubrious pace of "For Samuel Beckett," "Turfan Fragments" cycles much faster through the rotations of atonal leitmotifs and gradaually shifted chord progressions, sounding much more nervous than its preceeding composition on this disc. Yet, both pieces (performed here by Petr Kotik and the S.E.M. Emsemble) are exceptional and highly recommended examples of Feldman's third and final chapter of his impressive catalogue.
RealAudio clip: "For Samuel Beckett"
RealAudio clip: "Turfan Fragments"

FERRARI, LUC Cycle Des Souvenirs (1995-2000) (Blue Chopsticks) cd 14.98
A tautology is a statement which is necessarily true because it cannot be used to make a false assertion by virtue of its logical form. Often tautologies involve the needless repetition of a self-evident statement in order to prove that the idea is true; it can also take the form of asserting the truth of a statement by controlling the logic itself. Thus, the authoritarian decree, "because I said so!" defines one of the most common tautological situations. The maverick musique concrete composer Luc Ferrari continues to cite both of these definitions of a tautology when discussing his own work. The liner notes hold much more of the aura of the latter, with his autocratic voice insisting that this is important art and you better believe it! Yet his music which holds elements of the former, is far more seductive with the shifting repetitions of subtle aleatory themes that reflect Ferrari's ideas on memory as always being true to the individual who remembers. It's not clear if Ferrari has picked up these ideas from Proust, but that's another ball of wax.
His work on "Cycle Des Souvenirs" is something of an extension of the psychosexual narrative found within his "Presque Rien." Here field recordings were taken of European streets, the sea, a train station, wind through a valley, etc. with various fragments of speech whispered just beneath the surface of those judiciously edited recordings. The quiet of these passages are disrupted by clipped drum crashes which explode throughout the sonic landscape, further fragmenting the continuous spoken narrative. The end result is quite evocative, recalling Robert Ashley's masterful "Automatic Writing."
RealAudio clip: "1"
RealAudio clip: "4"

FERRARI, LUC Danses Organique (Elica) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Luc Ferrari left the reptutable INA-GRM outfit in the early 70s to take his expressive electronic & musique concrete experiments to his own studio. 'Danse Organique' is one of the earliest pieces Ferrari made in his own studio. "This could be a 'strange meeting between two girls and a tape recorder' and is one of his most unorthodox, lively, and sensually charged pieces. Ferrari lent his tape recorder to two girls who are supposed to meet and start a relationship and then builds his imaginary folkloric music around their confidential dialogue... The resulting music has a groovy rhythmic quality in its surreal synthetic development and is outstandingly modern with its similarities to some very unacademic electroacoustic music.

FERRARI, LUC Danses Organique (Elica) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Luc Ferrari left the reptutable INA-GRM outfit in the early 70s to take his expressive electronic & musique concrete experiments to his own studio. 'Danse Organique' is one of the earliest pieces Ferrari made in his own studio. "This could be a 'strange meeting between two girls and a tape recorder' and is one of his most unorthodox, lively, and sensually charged pieces. Ferrari lent his tape recorder to two girls who are supposed to meet and start a relationship and then builds his imaginary folkloric music around their confidential dialogue... The resulting music has a groovy rhythmic quality in its surreal synthetic development and is outstandingly modern with its similarities to some very unacademic electroacoustic music.

FERRARI, LUC Ephemere I & II (Alga Marghen) cd 21.00
Pay no attention to the liner notes, as the text is ultimately meaningless when attempting to describe this incredible recording by Luc Ferrari. The French musique concrete composer is mostly known for his psychosexual contextualizations that 'telescope' tape manipulated environmental recordings dotted with fleeting whispers of female voices. Symphonic works, pieces with indeterminant scores, radiophonic broadcasts, and theater have all worked within the expansive ouvre of Ferrari; but very little of the work that we had encountered prepared us for what's found on Ephereme. Here are two lengthy pieces recorded in the mid-'70s that look forward to the grim expressionism of the '80s post-industrialists coupled with the drugged-n-droned psychedelia that has been flourishing today!
The first piece is grounded upon a set of low-end synth tones that oscillate and slowly spiral into dissonant harmonic patterns. A stream of disembodied voices emerges from within this grey wash, for a very ghostly shortwave radio feel, with some resemblance to Delia Derbyshire's Dreams or Robert Ashley's Automatic Writing. Along with these voices, a slow churning plod from a downtuned piano furthers the tension of the piece, which gradually dissolves by the end when Ferrari replaces the voices with some lovely Takoma-inspired acoustic guitar playing; and here, the work is really sympathetic to those collages from irr. app. (ext.). Brilliant stuff! The second piece (which clocks in at a whopping 52 minutes) is a much brighter affair, again with synth tones and percolations reflecting the kosmische aesthetic of the day (e.g. Cluster, Tangerine Dream, etc.). Given the extended duration of the piece, all of the revolving sounds are not in any hurry to further their progressions. It's quite enveloping and meditative, somewhat like the droned parts of Natural Snow Buildings or some of the sprawling Emeralds tracks. Again, the acoustic guitar becomes the central focus by the end of this piece. As you could imagine, this sounds nothing like Ferrari's seminal Presque Rien, but it is an amazing document that more than holds its own against anything in his impressive back catalogue. Wow.
MPEG Stream: "Ephemere 1"
MPEG Stream: "Ephemere 2"

FERRARI, LUC Interrupteur/Tautologos 3 (Blue Chopsticks) cd 13.98
The debut release on David "Gastr Del Sol" Grubbs' new Drag City-sponsored label is the cd reissue of this rare LP by French musique concrete artist Ferrari. Apparently such an important work that the label states that "any other record that sounds like this is but a pale imitation."

FERRARI, LUC Presque Rien (INA/GRM) cd 21.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Smugly qualified by Ferrari as a "poor man's concrete music," "Presque Rien" is a brilliant piece of musique concrete that reflects the turbulent psychological landscape of Paris in the late '60s and early '70s. While the liner notes make no reference to participation in or sympathy with the Parisian rebellion of May 1968, Ferrari's "Music Promenade" (which opens the "Presque Rien" album) has a rough-hewn, decentralized quality which appears to refer to the incendiary immediacy of those few weeks. Yet as soon as the "Presque Rien" suites begin, the politically charged references of grim military waltzes, impassioned revolutionary speeches, and whirling factory sounds are done away with, in favor of subtle collages of natural sounds. It is as if Ferrari set up an aesthestic antithesis between the tense, urban sounds on "Music Promenade" and the suposedly placid sounds of nature on the rest of the album, all the while maintaining a firm grip on a psychoanalysis upon the landscape. Like Robert Ashley's ultra creepy "Purposeful Lady Slow Afternoon," Ferrari intertwines fragments of various whispered narratives with the steady buzzings of choral cicadas, as if each narration were that of a voyeur spying upon the intimacy of nature. Upon superficial listens, "Presque Rien" appears somewhat simple; however, do yourself the favor by listening to this attentively (preferrably on headphones) to capture the subtle theatrics of Ferrari's composition.
RealAudio clip: "Music Promenade 1"
RealAudio clip: "Presque Rien 2 pt. 2"
RealAudio clip: "Presque Rien Avec Filles pt. 1"

FERRARI, LUC Tautologos And Other Early Electronic Works (EMF Media) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Collection of early recordings from one of the pioneers of Musique Concrete. Includes "Etudes aux Accidents" & "Etudes aux sons Tendus" (from 1958), "Visages V" (1959), "Tete et Queue du Dragon" (1960), "Tautologos 1 & 2" (1961) and "Und so Weiter" (1966).
MPEG Stream: "Etudes Aux Accidents"
MPEG Stream: "Und So Weiter, Part 1"

FLYNT, HENRY Back Porch Hillbilly Blues, Volumes 1 & 2 (Bo Weevil) 2lp 38.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Finally available on vinyl, both volumes of Flynt's Back Porch Hillbilly Blues, on a deluxe double lp. And very limited!
Even packaged to look strikingly similar to an old Folkways LP release, this pair of Flynt releases on Locust sure do fit the "Hillbilly Blues" label more than any other release we've heard yet from him. And what's more, they're fucking great! No, you won't find any pseudo-ragas on either of these discs. This is wild and relentless, drone-y and hypnotic, sonically overwhelming neverending foot stomping, finger picked blues work outs. But as one might expect the workouts are static, shifting minutely and almost imperceptably if at all. Like a redneck hillbilly Terry Riley or La Monte Young.
The tracks on volume one go a little like this:
Track 1: Three and a half minutes of solo electric blues guitar, thankfully stripped of that awful standard blues chord progression.
Track 2: a short two and a half minute blast of nasal auctioneer style vocals, over a primitive country electric guitar riff.
Track 3: A massive twelve minutes of retarded toe tapping, to a hillbilly pizzicato on the fiddle that develops into increasingly manic sawing on just three notes.
And the tracks on volume two go a little like this:
Track 1: Five minutes of minimal amplified fiddle with lots of echo/delay, like music for some sort of space rodeo.
Track 2: 13 minutes of what sounds like a similar version of the first track, although this time without the echo/delay and a little more sawing on the higher notes of the fiddle.
Track 3: very traditional sounding blues progression on the fiddle, but stretched out a little. Definitely the easiest listening on either disc.
Track 4: Ten minutes long. Revisits the melodies of track two, but the sawing is more feverish and the sound is more thick and much less minimal. Eventually mutates into a super saturated, head nodding, blissed out transcendental hoedown!
Track 4: A gorgeous chunk of primitive, droney minimal blues, with humming vocals clocking in at a whopping 16 minutes.

FLYNT, HENRY C Tune (Locust) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Another gorgeous document of keening high end drone exploration from this central figure in the sixties Fluxus scene. The focus (as always) is on Flynt's electric fiddle, that squeals and scrapes and glides effortlessly between notes and deep into outerspace. Flynt's fiddle is accompanied by tamboura lending this piece a distinctly Middle Eastern flavor. Fans of Riley, Palestine, Nitsch, Cale and drone music in general will definitely want to pick this up.
RealAudio clip: "C Tune"

FLYNT, HENRY New American Ethnic Music Volume 4: Ascent To The Sun (Recorded) cd 16.98
You know it's a good day when a new Henry Flynt release comes out, especially one as good as this.
Ascent To The Sun is the fourth volume of the New American Ethnic Music Series, the first one being the two disc stunner of recordings from the early eighties, You Are My Everlovin'/Celestial Power. Recorded in December 2004, Ascent To The Sun is one forty minute track of layered electric violin. Sounding at times like a steam-powered freight train bound for glory or a heavily reverbed and fuzzed out harmonica, Flynt deftly applies Applachian back-porch idioms to his longform minimalist compositions that are ecstatically hypnotic in their alchemical channelling of pre-war American musical history. A quality in which he has been known to lambast his minimalist contemporaries for ignoring. Incredible!
MPEG Stream: "Ascent To The Sun"

FLYNT, HENRY Spindizzy (Recorded) cd 16.98
Henry Flynt's "Spindizzy" is the second volume in his series of "New American Ethnic Music," following the incredible document "You Are My Everlovin' / Celestial Power", an earlier assortment of country-fried, Fluxus inspired minimalism. Flynt had been an associate of both legendary '60s minimalist LaMonte Young and Fluxus figurehead George Macunias, finding his unique personal signature smack in between these two pillars of the '60s Fluxus scene as a conceptually / technically astute form of minimalism using the everyman aesthetic of Appalachian folk. These 10 tracks on "Spindizzy" all could be the warm-ups to front-porch hoedown stomps, yet Flynt prefers to endlessly cycle through the sustaining colorful tones of reverberant fiddle, banjo, and guitar. Really quite nice.
RealAudio clip: "Hoedown"
RealAudio clip: "Rockabilly Boogie"

FLYNT, HENRY & C.C. HENNIX Dharma / Warriors (Locust) cd 14.98
The well of Henry Flynt music never seems to dry up. Here, billed as Dharma Warriors, Flynt collaborates with C.C. Hennix on drums on two long guitar pieces recorded to boombox in Woodstock in 1983. Like a stripped down minimalist boogie version of Rhys Chatham or Glenn Branca, Flynt brings a lo-fi backwoods zen vibe to his raw and earthy modal jamming of repetitive riffs and fuzzy chords, while Hennix ties it together with his clattering scattershot drumming. Celestial indeed!
MPEG Stream: "Warriors of The Dharma"
MPEG Stream: "Mount Fuji On My Mind"

FLYNT, HENRY & C.C. HENNIX Dharma / Warriors (Locust) lp 17.98
Now available on vinyl!
The well of Henry Flynt music never seems to dry up. Here, billed as Dharma Warriors, Flynt collaborates with C.C. Hennix on drums on two long guitar pieces recorded to boombox in Woodstock in 1983. Like a stripped down minimalist boogie version of Rhys Chatham or Glenn Branca, Flynt brings a lo-fi backwoods zen vibe to his raw and earthy modal jamming of repetitive riffs and fuzzy chords, while Hennix ties it together with his clattering scattershot drumming. Celestial indeed!
MPEG Stream: "Warriors of The Dharma"
MPEG Stream: "Mount Fuji On My Mind"

FLYNT, HENRY & NOVA'BILLY Nova' Billy (Locust) cd 14.98
Out of all the various iterations of Henry Flynt's huge and wildly varied recorded output, we weren't sure what to expect with this release, the previously unreleased 1975 recording of Flynt's avant-punk hillbilly boogie outfit Nova'Billy. Wildly ecstatic and rhythmic, full of left-field honky-tonk idioms but never wonky, Nova'Billy is probably one of Flynt's most joyously rocking outings that we've heard. Different than the Velvet's-by-way-of-the-Fugs recordings of his early band incarnation, The Insurrections, Nova' Billy is tighter and much better produced. Flynt's singing is minimal but well-used and less grating than we've heard on other recordings. His vocal delivery on "I Was A Creep" is more like the Rev. Fred Lane than the Jandek-style realms it can sometimes enter on releases like Raga Electric. A fine reissue and one that should live towards the top of Flynt's surprisingly massive discography!
MPEG Stream: "Conga"
MPEG Stream: "Amphetamine Rhapsody"
MPEG Stream: "I Was A Creep"
MPEG Stream: "Double Spindizzy"

FLYNT, HENRY & THE INSURRECTIONS I Don't Wanna (Locust Music) cd 14.98
Wow. It's strange, after never having ever heard of this guy before like, 2 years ago, now I've practically got a whole shelf full of Henry Flynt cds -- all terrific stuff recorded at least two decades back, but only recently seeing the light of day. And they keep coming. This new one dates from way back in 1966, and is billed as a youthful Flynt's NYC art-punk garage rock band. That made us a little apprehensive (we've never really been Fugs fans, and that's what we thought it might sound like), but actually this turned out to be totally amazing! Most of the other Flynt recordings that have come out feature his violin playing, in a kind of '60s minimalism meets Appalachian folk style. But with The Insurrections (with Walter de Maria on drums, later famous for his Lightning Field scupture in the New Mexican desert) Flynt plays guitar instead of fiddle. It's weird country bluesy drone protest rock as only an academic hillbilly Fluxus artist could conceive. The Velvets meet a jug band at an acid test? Not quite, but close. No mere historical document, this is revelatory stuff, not sounding thirty years old but timeless instead. And the recording quality of this rehearsal tape is more than adequate. Somewhere betwixt hoedown and raga, these nine tracks represent a divergent strain of beat music not commonly associated with 1966 (though, that was the year of Black Monk Time, which this doesn't sound like, though you can imagine Flynt woulda liked that Monks LP, and for sure he shared their opinion of Uncle Sam). Again, a dusty tape from the vaults that puts today's crop of avant-blues-improv shitkickers to shame, whoever they are. Recommended.
MPEG Stream: "Go Down"
MPEG Stream: "Dreams Away"

FREIGHT ELEVATOR QUARTET, THE Becoming Transparent (Caipirinha) cd 16.98

FRIEDL, REINHOLD Inside Piano (Zeitkratzer) 2cd 23.00
Perhaps you're familiar with Zeitkratzer, the classically trained mavericks from Germany who have taken it upon themselves to produce orchestral arrangements of notorious pieces from scabrous noise musicians, notably Whitehouse, John Duncan, Keiji Haino, Zbigniew Karkowski, and Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. The ensemble has also ventured into arrangements of austere electronica (e.g. Carsten Nicolai and Terre Thaemlitz) and revisiting the classic avant-garde pieces from Alvin Lucier, John Cage, and Xenakis. Zeitkratzer's mastermind is the pianist Reinhold Friedl, who embraces the prepared model for the piano that Cage and company presented more than a half-century ago. In the liner notes here, Friedl offers plenty of examples of techniques developed to produce sound from various objects manipulating the strings inside the piano, including e-bows, fishing line, violin bows, rubber balls, and small motors. Through his own exploration of the prepared piano, he really attempts to create a vast orchestra of sounds which can be automated and / or perpepuated through extended passages. a rasping acoustic drone slowly building and mutating through multiple strings driven by e-bows and springs. The unholy racket of "Evasions Pour Deplaire" manifests in periodic movements scraped metal and bellowing more in keeping with a Z'ev action of junkyard gamelan follows the drone stasis. All of these demonic howls and squeals answer a whole lot of questions as to how Zeitkratzer was able to render their orchestrations of Metal Machine Music and the Whitehouse pieces in particular! L'Horizon Des Ballons is a long 30-plus minute excursion of dissonant crashes, razor slashed glissandos, and agitated acoustic noise, perpetuated through extended techniques. We recently listed an lp of the same name (and cover!), but all of the pieces on this 2cd set are entirely different from those found on the lp of the same name!
MPEG Stream: "Evasions Pour Deplaire"
MPEG Stream: "L'horizon Des Ballons"

FRIEDL, REINHOLD Inside Piano (Hronir) lp 33.00
Perhaps you're familiar with Zeitkratzer, the classically trained mavericks from Germany who have taken it upon themselves to produce orchestral arrangements of notorious pieces from scabrous noise musicians, notably Whitehouse, John Duncan, Keiji Haino, Zbigniew Karkowski, and Lou Reed's Metal Machine Music. The ensemble has also ventured into arrangements of austere electronica (e.g. Carsten Nicolai and Terre Thaemlitz) and revisiting the classic avant-garde pieces from Alvin Lucier, John Cage, and Xenakis. Zeitkratzer's mastermind is the pianist Reinhold Friedl, who embraces the prepared model for the piano that Cage and company presented more than a half-century ago. In the liner notes here, Friedl offers plenty of examples of techniques developed to produce sound from various objects manipulating the strings inside the piano - e-bows, fishing line, violin bows, rubber balls, and small motors. Through his own exploration of the prepared piano, he really attempts to create a vast orchestra of sounds which can be automated and / or perpepuated through extended passages. Side A is a very dynamic piece with all sorts of sonic activity erupting from within Friedl's piano, described by the man himself as his "full orchestra" with "low vibrations, bottleneck techniques, piping backgrounds, and scratching." It is an intense exploration of dissonant crashes, razor slashed glissandos, and agitated acoustic noise. Side two begins with a rasping acoustic drone slowly building and mutating through multiple strings driven by e-bows and springs. The unholy racket that follows is a variation on the first side with scraped metal and bellowing more in keeping with a Z'ev action of junkyard gamelan follows the drone stasis. All of these demonic howls and squeals answer a whole lot of questions as to how Zeitkratzer was able to render their orchestrations of Metal Machine Music and the Whitehouse pieces in particular! Oh yeah, the album was cut at 45rpm, so you know we played this at 33, where it sounds all the blacker. Thanks, Hronir!
FYI the tracks on here are entirely different than those on the 2cd with the same title and cover, oddly enough!

FULLMAN, ELLEN Staggered Stasis (Anomalous) cd 14.98
Minimalist composer Ellen Fullman speaks of her instrument quite lovingly. Considering the immense amount of time and energy that it takes to set up her long-stringed instrument, her attachment is understandable. When she recently moved to the Bay Area after many years in the Pacific Northwest, she had to radically change the architecture of her apartment by building an addition beyond the porch just to fit the multi-stringed device in the building. It's not enough for Fullman just to stretch long wires in any architectural space, for her pieces involve a complex mathematical foundation which enable Fullman an incredible amount of control when composing her extended drones and minimalist mantras.
Indebted to '60s minimalists like LaMonte Young, Arnold Dreyblatt, and Phil Niblock, Fullman's best work -- as found on Staggered Stasis -- suspends microtonal shifts amidst thick rasping drones rich with resonant overtones and complex harmonics. Fullman herself describes the work quite accurately, that "there is a flatness in this drama, what I imagine it must be like in the middle of an ocean, continually moving yet appearing the same." The end result is a much more contemplative and restrained aesthetic than the dynamic dronescapes of Organum and Andrew Chalk. This is a lovely and thororughly engaging work.
MPEG Stream: "Staggered Stasis Section 1"
MPEG Stream: "Duration"

FULLMAN, ELLEN & MONIQUE BUZZARTE Fluctuations (Deep Listening) cd 14.98

GAMELAN SON OF LION The Complete Gamelan In The New World (Locust) 2cd 17.98
Dunno if we can keep up with all the cool stuff that Locust has been putting out lately, but we'll try. And we definitely need to let you know about this one. This here double cd set is a remastered reissue of the contents of two obsure and out of print Folkways LPs from the early '70s that documented the activities of NYC's Gamelan Son Of Lion. That's right, this Gamelan wasn't from Indonesia, instead they were a bunch of long-haired, bearded American avant-gardists, among them Fluxus composer Philip Corner. Wasn't one of the Sun City Girls quoted recently in The Wire as saying the last thing he wanted to hear was white people playing a gamelan in a traditional manner? Well he'd probably be happy with this group. As much as by the ethnic musics of the East, this group seemed to be inspired by minimalism and Morton Feldman. Unlike "real" gamelan music I've heard, this isn't nearly so dense and rhythmic. It's rather more slow and spacious. Simple, even. But the resonating metal sounds are incredibly lovely. Our resident gamelan musician, Byram, didn't care for it as much...but then he gets to play with a gamelan quite often. And probably if you had your own gamelan (a home-made one like the Son of Lion folks built, with grapefruit juice cans and the like) you could come up with music a lot like the compositions heard here. But I don't, so I found this to be totally gorgeous and mesmerizing...
MPEG Stream: "In Scrolls Of Leaves"
MPEG Stream: "Gamelan II"

GELBER KLANG ENSEMBLE Farben Der Stille (Colours Of Silence) (Cybele) cd 23.00

GIBSON, JON Two Solo Pieces (New Tone) cd 24.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Flute, whoot!

GIBSON, JON Visitations I & II + Thirties (New Tone) cd 24.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Flute, whoot!

GLASS, PHILIP Analog (Orange Mountain Music) cd 21.00
It can be quite daunting to figure out how to navigate the releases of most 20th Century Composers. What is essential and what is not. That may be especially true for Philip Glass who has often walked the line between totally daring, trance inducing, mind expanding compositions and somewhat schmaltzy, overly sentimental syrupy pap. But there is no doubt, that when he's really ON, he still stands as one of the greatest minimalist composers of all time. Analog is -that- side of Glass, the side we never get tired of hearing. Recalling the intensity and brilliance of Music In 12 Parts, these recordings have been relentlessly seeping into our ears and brains and souls. Culled from never before released recordings made in the late 70's, it showcases Glass playing the electric organ, and it is absolutely hypnotic. Earlier this year you might remember us freaking out over a Finnish release from the band Shogun Kunitoki. It's uncanny how you can hear the roots of that record throughout these recordings. Warm analog notes played at a furiously feverish pitch that it's nearly impossible not to get lost in it's repetitive trance. The sound is so pleasingly physical and intense. And there are vocals, but fear not, they manage to become just another mesmerizing instrument working its way into your subconscious just like the flute, the (tasteful) sax and all the different keyboards. Originally conceived for his first scores for film as well as incidental music for a theater company, this is quickly becoming one of our favorite Glass recordings ever!
MPEG Stream: "Etoile Polaire: Victor's Lament"
MPEG Stream: "Mad Rush for Organ"
MPEG Stream: "Dressed Like An Egg: Part V"

GLASS, PHILIP Koyaanisqatsi (OST) (Orange Mountain Music) cd 21.00
Philip Glass's first commercial success and enduring classic soundtrack is available once again and in its original completed form (76 minutes) for the first time on cd. Glass's score to Godfrey Reggio's sublime 1983 film, Koyaanisqatsi (the Hopi Indian word meaning "life out of balance") is a perfect marriage to the film's altered time sequences of fast-moving clouds and sped-up machine-like urban scenes of traffic and city-life. The repetitive arpeggios and slowly undulating shifts of patterned movements give off the sensation of static motion enhancing the film's captivating majestic qualities. But even without the visuals, the score by itself stands the test of time, and its longer unabbreviated format renews the film's pointed silent protest against the out-of-control pace and shortened attention spans of our so-called civilization. Recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Koyannisqatsi"
MPEG Stream: "Resource"
MPEG Stream: "Vessels"

GLASS, PHILIP Music In Twelve Parts (Nonesuch) 3cd 54.00

GLASS, PHILIP & THE KRONOS QUARTET Dracula (Nonesuch) cd 15.98
Music by Mr. Glass composed as a new soundtrack to the Bela Lugosi vampire classic, as performed by Kronos. Did you know that the 'Bela Lugosi' and 'Bela Lugosi as Dracula' characters, names, and all related indicia are trademarks of one Bela G. Lugosi, presumably a descendant of the actor?

GLOBOKAR, VINKO Oblak Semen, Discours IX, Zlom (Sargasso) cd 14.98
Contemporary composer Vinko Globokar began his career in Slovenia as a jazz trombone player in the '50s, and he has since worked with Luciano Berio, Stockhausen and Takemitsu. This recording consists of three pieces composed in the 1990s: one for trombone, drum kit, fish aquarium (!) and dance steps (reminiscent of the works of Fluxus artists, especially his work for trombone and aquarium in which he plays the instrument with its bell partially submerged in water) one for two pianos; the last for an orchestra -- standard serialist fare.

GORDON, EDWARD LARRY Celestial Vibration (Universal Sound) cd 21.00
For the past couple of years, we've really been digging the recent unearthing of little known private press new age music whether it be Collie Ryan, William Eaton or Iasos. Lately we've been especially excited about this reissue from Universal Sound, of Edward Larry Gordon's 1978 debut. Gordon, or Laraaji, as he is otherwise known, creates long-form trance-inducing compositions using electronically enhanced zithers, auto-harps, kalimbas and other acoustic instruments that shimmer and radiate in beautifully meditative pulses. This record comprised of two thirty minute tracks, "All Pervading" and "Bethelehem" gained little notice upon its initial release, but thankfully it caught the attention of Brian Eno who subsequently produced his follow-up Days of Radiance for the EG Editions Ambient series in 1980 to wider acclaim. You can tell that Gordon was much inspired by earlier progenitors of cosmic music from Sun Ra to John and Alice Coltrane. You can especially hear the harp-like shimmer of Alice Coltrane in his treatments of the open tuned zither that he plays while in a complete meditative state. Really gorgeous stuff!
MPEG Stream: "All Pervading"
MPEG Stream: "Bethlehem"

GORDON, EDWARD LARRY Celestial Vibration (Universal Sound) lp 23.00
For the past couple of years, we've really been digging the recent unearthing of little known private press new age music whether it be Collie Ryan, William Eaton or Iasos. Lately we've been especially excited about this reissue from Universal Sound, of Edward Larry Gordon's 1978 debut. Gordon, or Laraaji, as he is otherwise known, creates long-form trance-inducing compositions using electronically enhanced zithers, auto-harps, kalimbas and other acoustic instruments that shimmer and radiate in beautifully meditative pulses. This record comprised of two thirty minute tracks, "All Pervading" and "Bethelehem" gained little notice upon its initial release, but thankfully it caught the attention of Brian Eno who subsequently produced his follow-up Days of Radiance for the EG Editions Ambient series in 1980 to wider acclaim. You can tell that Gordon was much inspired by earlier progenitors of cosmic music from Sun Ra to John and Alice Coltrane. You can especially hear the harp-like shimmer of Alice Coltrane in his treatments of the open tuned zither that he plays while in a complete meditative state. Really gorgeous stuff!
MPEG Stream: "All Pervading"
MPEG Stream: "Bethlehem"

GORDON, JACQUELINE dreamBlanket (Diagnosis...Don't!) cd-r 12.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Not only do the Grey Daturas kick up a serious noiserock ruckus, they also run their own cd-r label, the mysteriously titled Diagnosis... Don't! There are three new releases, and we managed to get a handful of each.
Gordon is an Oakland-based sound artist, who designs blankets with speakers sewn into them, each connected to some sound producing device, a toy or musical instrument, the listener is then encouraged to wrap themselves in the blanket, and luxuriate in the sounds produced by the listener's movement. Incredibly immersive and so goddamn cool! This disc captures a brief snippet of Gordon's installation. A warm fuzzy soundscape of distorted electronics, droning and growling, hissing and rumbling and whirls of haunting electronic glitches all woven into an undulating swirl of thick buzz and strange murky and mechanical melody.
SUPER LIMITED (of course!). Each disc comes packaged in two squares of one of Gordon's blankets, sewn together into an oven mitt like sleeve.
MPEG Stream: "dreamBlanket"

GORDON, MICHAEL [Purgatorio] Popopera (Cantaloupe Music) cd ep 5.98
Best known as one of the cofounders and directors of the great Bang On A Can new music festival in New York, Michael Gordon is also a pretty damn great composer in his own right. Performed by a guitar ensemble led by Emio Greco, this twenty minute composition finds Gordon channeling the likes of New York avant powerhouses like Glen Branca and Rhys Chatham. Sounds that conjure images of rushing waves, cascading waterfalls and thundering eruptions. [Purgatorio] Popopera has the range to appeal to not just classical music fans, but also folks into dramatic and exquisite post-rock like Mogwai and Explosions In The Sky, albeit perhaps with a slightly more avant-garde influence. Cool stuff, and cheap too.
MPEG Stream: "[Purgatorio] Popopera"

GORECKI, HENRYCK Kleines Requiem fur Eine Polka (Nonesuch/Elektra) cd 15.98

GRAHAM, KENNY & HIS SATELLITES Moondog And Suncat Suites (Trunk) cd 16.98
If you were ever curious to hear how Moondog might have sounded had he been recorded by Joe Meek, then here is your chance! Trunk records rescues this exquisite rarity from complete obscurity that displays the early influence of The Viking of 6th St. on a group of Britain's finest jazz players. Recorded in 1956, and engineered by a young Joe Meek, the underrated alto saxophonist Kenny Graham assembled a band of amazing session players, including Stan Tracey, Phil Seamen, Danny Moss, and Ivor Slaney (who recorded the horror soundtracks Terror and Prey we reviewed awhile back, though he is here in less horrific mode), as well as the evocative vocals of singer Yolanda to record this two part tribute. The first part, The Moondog Suite, covers ten of Moondog's early compositions, five short percussive pieces and five longer songs including "Utsu, "Chant", "Fog On The Hudson" and Lullaby". The six pieces in the "Suncat Suite" (Suncat, get it?) are all originals inspired by Moondog's pieces. These range from short eastern influenced numbers to more complex compositions of mesmerizing exotica, sometimes swinging, and at other times more moody. The production for both is sharp. The percussion zings, the vibes crisply resonate and the horns and woodwinds sound impeccable. Trunk scores again with this amazing reissue.
MPEG Stream: "Chant "
MPEG Stream: "Utsu"
MPEG Stream: "Tropical Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Sunday"

GRAHAM, KENNY & HIS SATELLITES Moondog And Suncat Suites (Trunk) lp 17.98
If you were ever curious to hear how Moondog might have sounded had he been recorded by Joe Meek, then here is your chance! Trunk records rescues this exquisite rarity from complete obscurity that displays the early influence of The Viking of 6th St. on a group of Britain's finest jazz players. Recorded in 1956, and engineered by a young Joe Meek, the underrated alto saxophonist Kenny Graham assembled a band of amazing session players, including Stan Tracey, Phil Seamen, Danny Moss, and Ivor Slaney (who recorded the horror soundtracks Terror and Prey we reviewed awhile back, though he is here in less horrific mode), as well as the evocative vocals of singer Yolanda to record this two part tribute. The first part, The Moondog Suite, covers ten of Moondog's early compositions, five short percussive pieces and five longer songs including "Utsu, "Chant", "Fog On The Hudson" and Lullaby". The six pieces in the "Suncat Suite" (Suncat, get it?) are all originals inspired by Moondog's pieces. These range from short eastern influenced numbers to more complex compositions of mesmerizing exotica, sometimes swinging, and at other times more moody. The production for both is sharp. The percussion zings, the vibes crisply resonate and the horns and woodwinds sound impeccable. Trunk scores again with this amazing reissue.
MPEG Stream: "Chant "
MPEG Stream: "Utsu"
MPEG Stream: "Tropical Sun"
MPEG Stream: "Sunday"

GRUPPO DI IMPROVVISAZIONE NUOVA CONSONANZA Musica Su Schemi (Get Back) lp 14.98
If there was such a thing as "catchy" improv this sumptuous, careful record would be it. Not reading Italian I am in the dark as to the extent to which this recording is based on "game theory", but the numerous pictures of chess boards in the room with the assembled throng of Italian composer/improvisors suggests that some kind of game based operation produced these sounds- but you don't need to be Bobby Fischer or speak Italian to be stunned by the beauty, immediacy and focus of this gathering, which includes luminaries such as Ennio Morriconne. Far from the skronking racket which "improv" can call to mind in some listeners, there is a kind of majestic, attentive, and totally confident quality to these performances that will have the hair on your neck standing at attention, and the cinematic scope of Morricone's past work is fully in evidence here. When all six musicians build up a resonant, triumphant drone from horns and piano in "Ommaggio a Giacinto Scelsi", both honoring and extending the work of the Italian aristocrat/mystic composer, the result is a kind of 17 minute long "transport" that very little contemporary music comes close to. Best of all, they also know when to make a track only two minutes long! Required listening for fans of Morricone, Supersilent, Godspeed or AMM. - Drew Daniel

GUDNADOTTIR, HILDUR Without Sinking (Touch) cd 16.98
Hildur Gudnadottir has such a way with the cello, able to create such utterly moving music that is filled with nuance and texture but that is also so deeply emotional. Hailing from Iceland, Gudnadottir's resume includes collaborations and partnerships with the likes of Pan Sonic, Mum, Sigur Ros, Angel, BJ Nilsen, etc. It's so nice to get to hear her take center stage, carefully crafting a sound that is about as moody and beautiful as music really gets. Perfect for those eternal gray days we are faced with so often in San Francisco, this is a record we put on when we just want to get lost in the fog and haze. There is very nice and subtle processing throughout the album as well, and here and there Gudnadottir tries her hand at the zither with stunning results. Johann Johansson adds organ on a few tracks as well, and fans of HIS best work as well as music by folks like Sylvain Chauveau, Philip Glass, Michael Cashmore, Joan Jeanrenaud and Colleen should for sure check this out. Truly elegant and intensely resonant. And thus highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Erupting Light"
MPEG Stream: "Overcast"
MPEG Stream: "Into Warmer Air"

GUDNADOTTIR, HILDUR Without Sinking (Touch) 2lp 22.00
NOW AVAILABLE ON VINYL, WITH THREE EXTRA TRACKS!!!
Hildur Gudnadottir has such a way with the cello, able to create such utterly moving music that is filled with nuance and texture but that is also so deeply emotional. Hailing from Iceland, Gudnadottir's resume includes collaborations and partnerships with the likes of Pan Sonic, Mum, Sigur Ros, Angel, BJ Nilsen, etc. It's so nice to get to hear her take center stage, carefully crafting a sound that is about as moody and beautiful as music really gets. Perfect for those eternal gray days we are faced with so often in San Francisco, this is a record we put on when we just want to get lost in the fog and haze. There is very nice and subtle processing throughout the album as well, and here and there Gudnadottir tries her hand at the zither with stunning results. Johann Johansson adds organ on a few tracks as well, and fans of HIS best work as well as music by folks like Sylvain Chauveau, Philip Glass, Michael Cashmore, Joan Jeanrenaud and Colleen should for sure check this out. Truly elegant and intensely resonant. And thus highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Erupting Light"
MPEG Stream: "Overcast"
MPEG Stream: "Into Warmer Air"