FELDMAN, MORTON For Bunita Marcus (Sub Rosa) cd 15.98

FELDMAN, MORTON For Philip Guston (Dog W/A Bone) 4cd 51.00
One of Feldman's later, and longer, works, "For Philip Guston" clocks in at just under five hours. Performed by Petr Kotik (flute, alto flute, piccolo), Joseph Kubera (piano, celeste), and Chris Nappi (vibraphone, marimbaphone, glockenspiel, chimes) of the S.E.M. Ensemble, Guston is one of the zeniths of Feldman's acheivements. A piece stretched out to such an extreme length is, as Feldman admitted himself, quite a difficult task. The ability to have a piece which retains a natural, organic quality without losing control over it and controlling the development of the piece without being forced into repetitive banality was a compositional conundrum that Feldman struggled with more and more as his pieces grew in length. How Feldman manages to get this piece off the ground, I don't know, but he does and keeps it flying the whole 4-plus hours -- with the help of some excellent musicians. The entire piece (I hope I'm not scaring anyone out there with this) was recorded in a studio, but still has the quality of a hall performance, perhaps touched up with some nice reverb. The studio method of recording the piece has the side effect of causing such everyday performance anomalies such as page turning to become amplified much greater than what one would experience in a hall setting and the flautist Kotik suggests that this be used as a measuring device to set the volume properly at home: if you can hear the page turns clearly, turn down the volume. The booklet included with this issue has a conversation between Petr Kotik and Walter Zimmerman... but maybe "conversation" is the wrong word. I think maybe "argument" might applied here to better describe their dialog, and a hilarious argument it is. A hoot for anyone who gets a kick out of listening to musicologists scrapple.
RealAudio clip: "For Philip Guston"

FELDMAN, MORTON Give My Regards To Eighth Street: Collected Writings Of Morton Feldman (Exact Change) book 15.95

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
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

FELDMAN, MORTON String Quartet (II) (Hat Hut) 4cd 34.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

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"

FELIX DA HOUSECAT Kittenz And Thee Glam (Emperor Norton) cd 16.98
Now available domestically with new artwork via Los Angeles based Emperor Norton: the long awaited debut long player from Chicago DJ / remixer extraordinaire Felix Stallings aka Felix Da Housecat. "Kittenz And Thee Glitz" shuffles through a hearty mix of electro, techno and house. Unfortunately for Stallings, the recent bandwagoneering of new electro outfits gives little credibility to this dance music veteran's inclusion of said genre. Decent stuff overall, not outstanding - it is *dance* music after all, nothing more. Still, more arty and interesting than the standard techno / house fare, yet more mainstream than the Kompakt / BPitch / WMF / Shitkatapult techno sound. Features the dancefloor smash "Silver Screen Shower Scene".
RealAudio clip: "Happy Hour"
RealAudio clip: "Silver Screen Shower Scene"

FELL VOICES s/t (Human Resources) lp 12.98
We'd been hearing about these guys for ages, a trio from Santa Cruz who were apparently mixing raw thrashing black buzz a la Bone Awl with sprawling epic arrangements, as in songs going on 20, sometimes 30 minutes.
So here we have their debut full length, a two song lp, two tracks, each filling up an entire side, one nearly 19 minutes, the other more than 21 minutes, and right out of the gate they explode into a frenzy of blasting beats and blurred insectoid riffing, growled demonic vocalizing, but over the course of these songs, the band explore all sorts of variations, slipping into loping mathy post rock, soaring epic Norwegian style majesty, doomic d-beat pounding, lurching stop / start breakdowns, long stretches of ominous ambience, lumbering Burzumic crush, slow burning distortion drenched drift, all held together with consistent elements that lead one part to another, streaks of buzz, minimal mysterious guitar figures, the sound of rain, droning bits of serpentine guitar. It's more than just long songs created by glomming shorter songs together. These tracks are expertly arranged and composed, the move with mood and purpose, melodies disappear only to resurface later, parts shift and twist and become repurposed, there are refrains, but there are also parts that appear once and are gone.
The B-side starts out like some sort of black drone record, heaving sheets of crumbling distorted buzz, woozy and wavery, before the band explodes into yet another flurry of soaring guitars and pounding rhythms, this time though it's all tension and no release, like the most dramatic part of some Godspeed epic translated into epic blackness, until the band finally slip into something more classically BM, but only just, this song/side too is a convoluted path, serpentine and impossible to predict, with some incredible surprisingly un-BM at times drumming, amazing catchy riffs, and the ambience this time relegated to near the end of the track, the furious blasting giving way to some haunting spectral drift, taking forever to fade out completely, instead, blasting at a barely audible level, just below the seemingly tranquil surface, eventually disappearing completely, leaving the track to wind down gently, with a languid, darkly pretty final few minutes. So awesome. Fell Voices are definitely a band folks into Weakling and Wolves In The Throne Room and Fauna and all that sort of sprawling epic blackness should check out. A new favorite of the black hordes around here for sure...

FELL VOICES s/t (2008 Demo) (Analog Worship) lp 12.98
Yet ANOTHER self titled record from the Fell Voices / Ash Borer black metal axis, which makes it even more difficult to keep track of which is what, but this one IS subtitled 2008 demo, and as that would rightfully lead you to believe this is FV's 2008 demo, previously available only on cassette, on vinyl for the first time, and the packaging is swank and deluxe, but more on that in a second.
This is FV's very first recording ever, and as such, demonstrates two things, one, a much more lo-fi sound quality, and two, an already fully formed sound, that the band would hone on subsequent records, the sound quality and recording fidelity improving as they went, that said, even with a more raw sound, these two tracks are incredible, the band already masters of the sidelong black metal epic, the A side beginning with a slow build, all chaotic drums over clan guitars, weird and woozy, the sound building and building, eventually coalescing into something more buzzy and blast, but even then the guitars remain super low in the mix, and SOUND clean still, which gives the sound a cool strange vibe, add in some bellowed demonic vox, some stretches of doomed out dirgery, all deep droning vox and tribal drumming, and then a crazy chaotic mathrock/noiserock outro. Lo-fi for sure, but still so epic and heavy and intense.
The flipside is much more black metal sounding, but with some serious D-best sounding stretches, a little punky, but still plenty black and blasting, with cool droned out guitars, and a super stunning interlude that's all blurred drones and muted feedback, which leads directly into some spaced out psychedelic drift, before the band lurches back into the fray.
PRESSED ON 180 GRAM VINYL!! Housed in thick sleeves, with a printed insert, LIMITED TO 367 COPIES!!

FELL VOICES Untitled (II) (Howling Mine / Gilead Media) lp 14.98
The latest epic slab of atmospheric black metal from this Northern California black metal duo begins with a warm bit of swoonsome, softly pulsing synth swirl, before the band launch into the first of two sidelong tracks, and immediately, the sound here is harder, and harsher, and heavier, the vibe is definitely atmospheric, but much more grim and buzzy, the two immediately locked into a hazy galloping expanse of majestic melodic blackness, droned out and trancelike, hypnotic and mesmerizing, sounding like it could (and maybe should) go on forever and ever, until the sound suddenly and gloriously ruptures, the song exploding into a gout of gnarled mathy chaos, before slipping right back into the trancey buzz.
The sound does eventually shift, the guitars soaring, fast picked melodies all tangled up with the relentless drum pound, eventually the song settling into a woozy, moody, buzz free creep, just mournful guitars wrapped around melodic bass, and a plodding almost doomy dirge. The band slowly build adding layer after layer, eventually returning to a furious tranced out buzz once again, but here the guitars seem slippery, the riffs even more tangled, the sound warped and even more chaotic, the black buzz slipping into almost white noise territory before finally collapsing into a long stretch of muted, murky grumbling grey drones.
The B side starts off distinctly more doomy, thick, reverbed minor key chords drift over a simple, slo-mo drum trudge, atmospheric, ominous, haunting, it's only a minute or two before this track too explodes in a frenzy of musical violence, an avalanche of blackened chaos, careening riffs, buried howls, splattery drumming, the various elements eventually coalesce into something more solidly black and buzzy, but before too much time has passed, the band transform it into some strange black doom, the chords tarpit slow, but the drums still blasting away, the vocals a beastly gurgle, before once again letting the buzzing blackness overtake them. This track, like the first side, is constantly shifting, from more clean shimmery ambience, to some gorgeously melodic churning guitardrone, that sounds like BM riffs blurred into hypnotic muddy swirls, and like the A side, this track finishes with a long stretch of minimal drift, this time, hazy synths, minimal percussion and haunting cinematic piano stabs, creepy, and harrowingly beautiful.
LIMITED TO 750 COPIES, pressed on thick vinyl, and housed in super heavy jackets.

FELL, MARK Multistability (Raster-Noton) cd 17.98
A couple of lists back, we highlighted the Editions Mego disc UL8 by minimal techno artist Mark Fell. It was one of two solo albums from snd member Fell that were recently released more or less simultaneously. So here's the other one, via the Raster-Noton label quite appropriately, and it's another intense, experimental exercise in the controlled chaos of (ir)rhythmic variations. 17 tracks, 64 minutes of glitched out, Geiger-countery goodness. If you liked the complex, computery patterns of UL8, you'll like this too! Repetitive, seizure-threatening stuff here, a seemingly endless array of stunning, stuttering clicks, claps, ticks and kicks... it's like the distorted, digitally bent creakings of teetering, tweaked electronic architecture built by Fell from precise blueprints for perverse purposes. His constructions are varied enough, exploring both skittering texture and shuffling groove, to hold earphone interest for the duration. At times it sounds kinda like club music composed by Conlon Nancarrow for synth and typewriter. Any fan of Alva Noto, Ryoji Ikeda, etc. ought to investigate this and UL8 too if you haven't already.
MPEG Stream: "Multistability 3"
MPEG Stream: "Multistability 10-A,11"
MPEG Stream: "Multistability 9"

FELL, MARK UL8 (Editons Mego) cd 16.98
Some will be curious about this simply on account of how it's an Editions Mego release, by Mark Fell who is one half of snd, the UK glitch-house duo that used to record for Mille Plateaux. For us, it was more that the bright orange digipak cover with shiny metallic silver artwork caught our eye, and then we read the text on the back that includes such sentences as "Using 32 operator frequency modulation synthesis configured in 16 pairs of operator and modulator, panned at equal positions around the circumference of a circle using high order ambisonics." And: "With 2, 4, and 8 channel rectangular waveshapes with variable pulse width subject to frequency modulation from synchronised sine functions with variable phase offsets." Intriguing, no?
What it it all boils down to is minimal techno electronics: clinical, precise, and purely rhythmic. Only the relatively blissed-out final track, "Death Of A Loved One", brings in much melodic coloration at all. Otherwise, Fell's music sounds a bit like a malfunctioning Geiger counter (especially the five track opening sequence "The Occultation of 3C 273"), with some pieces (the seven part "Vortex Studies") shuffling in buzzing, fizzing, distorted textures as well, and others (the "Acids In The Style Of Rian Treanor" series) incorporating sizzling synth squiggle. It's all very mesmeric (to some, maybe maddening to others), often energetically urgent, a dense, complex, pitter patter patterning of clicks, claps, and kicks, ratcheting up and down, constructed with conceptual, architectural logic... Definitely for fans of Alva Noto, Ryoji Ikeda, Senking, Mika Vanio, and Kazunao Nagata (Zero Gravity).
Fell also has another new, simultaneously released cd out on Raster-Noton, we'll have to get that one reviewed soon too!
MPEG Stream: "The Occultation of 3C 273 (I)"
MPEG Stream: "The Occultation of 3C 273 (V)"
MPEG Stream: "Vortex Studies (I)"

FELT Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty (Cherry Red) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Don't know too much about Felt or their history. In fact, I always just assumed that I didn't like Felt. Not sure why. A lot of it had to do with the time these records originally came out, the early eighties, precisely when I was just getting into punk rock or metal. Same goes for some other folks here at AQ. So it kind of makes sense that we never discovered this stuff, or if we did, we sure as heck weren't ready for it. So imagine our surprise when we finally actually heard Felt (umm..several months ago, I know I know...give us a break) and realized just how darn good this stuff was. So good that I'm not sure I can do them justice in a review. Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty is the first in a 10 cd comprehensive reissue of all of Felt's records. Originally released in 1982, Crumbling is a minimal indie jangle pop masterpiece, simple guitar figures soaked in jangly reverby, crystalline melodies picked out on shimmering electric guitars over whispery mumbled vocals buried in the mix. So completely mesmerizing and hypnotic. Shades of Factory records, the Smiths, and definitely the Durutti Column. Imagine a more cerebral, minimal version of Icicle Works or Modern English or any of that eighties new wave stuff. Not at all what we expected or imagined but pretty amazing. Can't wait for the next nine!
MPEG Stream: "Evergreen Dazed"
MPEG Stream: "Birdmen"

FELT Forever Breathes The Lonely Word (Cherry Red) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Felt are such a weird band. Totally mysterious album art, cryptic album titles, bizarre lyrics and song titles, everything shrouded in mystery, but the actual music of Felt is anything but mysterious or cryptic. Forever Breathes The Lonely Word released originally in 1986, is a lush eighties indie pop record swathed in warm warbly organs and jangly keeing guitars. A surprisingly upbeat outing for Felt, who are more often maudlin and dreary and dark. Forever is filled with subtly propulsive rhythms, minor key arrpegiated guitars, chiming melodies, thick washes of synth blur and lots of vocals, delivered in a Lou Reed / Mark Knopfler sort of singspeak drawl that adds a world weary quality to Felt's already melancholy indie jangle.
MPEG Stream: "Rain Of Crystal Spires"
MPEG Stream: "Down But Not Yet Out"

FELT Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death (Cherry Red) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
I always wanted to love this record just for the title. I mean, what a great album title, mysterious and creepy and a bit nonsensical. And surprisingly not at all representative of the sounds found within. Originally released in 1986, Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death perfectly coincided with my descent into metal, which explains how I managed to miss Felt entirely as well as sidestepping all things Creation and 4AD and jangly new wave in general. But it's probably just as well, since at the time, I probably wan't in a position to appreciate the ephemeral, ethereal beauty of Felt. Sonically very reminiscent of the Smiths, Durutti Column and the mellower side of Factory Records, Felt are a warm, shimmery musical blanket, woven from warbly synthesizers, shufflng rhythms, jangly guitars, chiming melodies, all moody and melancholy, muted and minor key. Sometimes jazzy and lounge-y, sometimes dark and lugubrious, Let the Snakes Crinkle Their Heads To Death is a perfect eighties late night instrumental bliss out record. So nice.
MPEG Stream: "Song For William S. Harvey"
MPEG Stream: "The Seventeenth Century"

FELT Splendour Of Fear (Cherry Red) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Don't know too much about Felt or their history. In fact, I always just assumed that I didn't like Felt. Not sure why. A lot of it had to do with the time these records originally came out, the early eighties, precisely when I was just getting into punk rock or metal. Same goes for some other folks here at AQ. So it kind of makes sense that we never discovered this stuff, or if we did, we sure as heck weren't ready for it. So imagine our surprise when we finally actually heard Felt (umm..several months ago, I know I know...give us a break) and realized just how darn good this stuff was. So good that I'm not sure I can do them justice in a review. Splendour Of Fear is the second in the Felt reissue series, originally released in 1984. It takes the minimal crystalline indie pop jangle of 1982's Crumbling The Antiseptic Beauty and adds a little darkness, and a little more low end, and becomes a bit more brooding and serious compared to its predecessor's sunny sparkling sheen. But only a little. The drums and the bass are more present giving the tunes a bit more heft and the vocals are still mumbled and way down in the mix, but it's still all about the guitars, shimmering and crystal clear, mantra like meldoies stream from electric guitars like rivers of sparkling diamonds. Again sonically reminiscent of the Smiths and Factory records. In fact Felt sound like late night chill out music for the Factory set. So great!
MPEG Stream: "The World Is As Soft As Ice"
MPEG Stream: "The Optimist And The Poet"

FELT Train Above The Ciy (Cherry Red) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ Clash-Ups 1 (self-released) cd-r 6.98

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ Clash-Ups 2 (self-released) cd-r 6.98

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ Constance Towers (self-released) cd-r 9.98
We love the mix tape. Or maybe now it's the mix cd. Regardless, it's hard to beat a killer mix of obscure sonic weirdness, the best mixes being the ones where the various tracks and elements blend into a new musical experience entirely. With the occasional glimpse of a recognizable tune, melody or sonic snippet surfacing here and there, the sort of collection that rewards close listening, but sounds just as good in a background music capacity. Such is the case with the latest disc from local DJ / turntablist DJ Female Convict Scorpion (who also manages whistle, sampler and theremin!). Anyone who names themselves after Shunya Ito's classic series of Japanese woman in prison / revenge flicks is definitely on the right wavelength.
Constance Towers is more mix than turntable experiment, but there are plenty of subtle sonic mysteries lurking beneath the excellent song choice and deft mixing. Beginning all soulful and jazzy, groovy and laid back, a slowed down funk work out, sun baked and washed out, peppered with subtle effects and bits of dialogue, the disc soon morphs into blessed out dub, transforming quickly into some haunting soundtrack, all swooning strings and drawn out drones, before exploding into some super kick ass blown out 70's cop show funk, with buzzing synths and fuzzy guitar. And that's just the first few tracks, the rest of the disc veers wildly all over the map, somehow managing to sound perfectly cohesive. Freaked out percussion jams, creepy exotica, propulsive krautrock, wild afrojazz, super distorted post punk jams, honkey tonk country, but all tangled and woven into each other, shifting speeds and tempos, drifting voices and effects, multiple tracks piled on one another, a gorgeous, hypnotic, sonic trip. Funky and groovy enough to jam at your next dance party, but dark and varied and mysterious enough for headphone deep listeningÉ
MPEG Stream: "12:00 am - Prologue / Mozart And The Dolomites"
MPEG Stream: "1:00 am - Constance Towers"
MPEG Stream: "2:00 am - Emergeth... Borts Minorts"

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ Frosoblomster (self-released) cd-r 10.98
Mix number two from mysterious local turntablist and DJ, the brilliantly monickered DJ Female Convict Scorpion, whose mixes are less DJ mash-ups and more haunting artistic assemblages, incorporating free jazz, fuzzy funk, found sounds, bits of dialogue, sampled instruments, stripped down beats, pretty much no genre is off limits, but those genres are basically meaningless once everything is mixed together.
From the opening track, with its ominous chiming bells beneath Tom Waits' gravelly voice spinning a yarn, the mix slips smoothly, into a deep laid back minimal grooves, surrounded by swirling sheets of soft focus effects, before the mix shifts, and wailing female vox are draped over a thumping beat, a sea of record crackle, bits of hum and distant whir, Shadow wouldn't be all that far off as a reference, but imagine if Shadow was raised on prog and punk rock and art films and free jazz, then how would a mix of his sound? A bit like this perhaps.
The tracks veer wildly from super rhythmic workouts, to drifting minimal soundscapes, strange electronics drift in and out, mournful horns, spidery guitars, strings are bowed and plucked, deep rumbles surface from below, tribal drumming is laid beneath tangled world music voices, creating gorgeous and unintended harmonies, dense clouds of blooping bleeping effects over skittery free jazz skronk, dark reverbed noir-ish guitars shimmering beneath subtle percussion, breathless vocalizing and steel string scrape, deep ritualistic chanting drifting over the sound of sirens, funky drumming and subtle barely there dronemusic in the distance, Really good stuff. Made even better by the fact that we weren't able to identify a single source for any of the sounds within!!
Beautiful packaging. Full color printing on thick matte paper, super haunting and tripped out imagery, pressed on black cd-r's each with an actual postage from some other country affixed to the face.
MPEG Stream: "Dum Sechs Unt Glum eine Rum"
MPEG Stream: "Floorshow At The Top OF The World"
MPEG Stream: "The Peaches 'n' Herb Of Freak Folk"

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ INRI (self-released) cd-r 9.98
Latest mix from this aQ beloved audio alchemist, who when he's not whipping up these murky mixes and strange sonic concoctions is playing guitar in local druggy space rockers 3 Leafs, or touring with Acid Mothers Gong or performing in a play, or even lending his voice to some video game.
But in his guise of DJ Female Convict Scorpion (yep, named for that Japanese series of women in prison flicks), his main concern is taking cool records, and melting them down into something totally new, a blurred otherworldly soundscape melding obscure jazz to lost krautrock, twisted grooves to mysterious ambience, shimmery washed out drifts wrapped around spaced out riffs and everything wreathed in old record crackle and pop. This is the sort of dark and downer DJ we want spinning records when we go out. But then listening to this stuff we imagine going out to some dark, dank, stone-walled cave-like dive, populated with all manner of shadow figures, everything lit by candlelight and firelight, the threat of violence heavy in the air...
This latest mix was presented to us as 'perfect for aQ' and then with the added descriptor 'the most evil and dark mix yet', indeed. Right down to the cover, an upside down, upside down cross (meaning rightside up) superimposed on a proper pentagram, the evil version rotated 180 degrees. And sonically, right out of the gate, some sort of black mass incantation, draped over a murky muted krautrock rhythm, laced with squalls of church organ, swirls of whipping wind, until finally, the beat kicks in, and we're off, wild psychedelic drumming, sampled fist fights, swoonsome woozy basslines, shimmery strings, strange effects and backwards loops, the various records shifting pitch, making everything warbly and trippy, and that's just the first track!
And it only gets better from there, long stretches of shimmery star field effects, some super cool rhythms, lots of slinky slithery grooves, bleating horns, field recordings, soulful vox, plenty of low slung slo-mo grooves, some killer mash ups of blackened creep and sweet soul, but also some full on horror movie soundtrack music, and so it goes slipping easily from bass heavy thrum to blissed out ethereal drift, psychedelic spaced out chaos to brooding cinematic swirl, all seemingly underpinned by a haunting sinister vibe, sometimes it's thick undulating bass buzz, othertimes it's less the sound and more just the arrangement, DJ FCS deftly conjuring up some serious audial evil. Awesome.
MPEG Stream: "Benedictus Satanas"
MPEG Stream: "Endful Summer"
MPEG Stream: "Dante's Towering Inferno"

FEMALE CONVICT SCORPION, DJ WWZ (self-released) lp 14.98
Record number three, and the first actual lp release, from this local turntablist / mixologist / soundsculptor, who some of you may know as a member of various local rock units Three Leafs, Citay, the Auricle and others but as DJ Female Convict Scorpion, this mystery man weaves a sprawling web of sound, that is probably more aQ worthy than most DJ's we can think of, krautrock, to funk, to soundtrack, to psych rock, to space rock to drone, manipulated lps, but also effects and various insturments, a dizzying sonic overload, skittery rhythms, soulful horns, mysterious disembodied voices, lots of turntable warble, dragged vinyl rumble, spaced out reverby shimmer, pusling new age drift, skeletal grooves wrapped around glistening barely there melodies, warped old jazz records, plenty of crackle and pop, backwards beats, field recordings, haunting cinematic ambience gives way to electronic squiggle which in turn gives way to clattery free rock stumble, subsumed by a thick swell of speaker rattling low end rumble, detuned guitar, purloined preacher ranting, big pounding drums, free jazz skronk.
Fluttery flutes flit over a field of hum and shimmer, pepperd with electronic glitches and distorted intercepted boradcasts, mournful folk draped over, thick crunch and thrum, slowly melting into a sprawl of hushed blackened buzz, which dissipates leaving a funky drummer groove, which finally peters out into a barren expanse of twisted squelch and distant twang, more displaced voices, wrapped in an undulating slab of distorted bass throb, a twisted woozy rhythm, that drones on and on beneath swirling FX, Eastern percussive skitter, warbly horns, a washed out laid back coda to a long strange sonic trip.
Cool packaging too, each lp housed in it's own hand made duct taped sleeve, created from recycled zombie movie soundtracks!
MPEG Stream: "1"
MPEG Stream: "2"
MPEG Stream: "3"

FEMBOTS Small Town Murder Scene (Paper Bag Records) cd 14.98

FEN Ancient Sorrow (Northern Silence) cd ep 11.98
While ostensibly a black metal band, the UK's Fen, are so much more than that. In fact, take away the vocals, and in a blind taste test we would have been hard pressed to describe them as black metal at all.
The sound is all loping rhythms, soaring chords, the sound majestic and epic, minor key and mathy. The first track sounds more like Isis or Pelican than it does Darkthrone or Deathspell. Well, actually, it does remind us a bit of Deathspell's most postrock moment, the genius Kenose. The band are described as 'atmospheric black metal / post rock' which would be a tad more accurate if you swapped the two descriptors. Even the riffs sound more like something off a Polvo or Pitchblende record, which is not a bad thing at all. In fact, we're a little bit obsessed with Fen. Another band whose sound is one we had always sort of wished for. Nineties math rock black metal! It's really uncanny listening to these three songs how often our ears catch a little Archers Of Loaf or Rodan or Don Cab or Bitch Magnet. And the thing is, the sound may be a bit heavier and more distorted, it's really only the vocals that turn this into black metal. If Fen were an instrumental band, they wouldn't sound all that out of place on Touch And Go. But they are heavy, and they are a bit black, and as if to prove it, the closer is the heaviest, and the least overtly mathy of the bunch. A plodding churning doomy chunk of loping blackened crush. And near the end of the 12+ minute track, the band even actually explode for the very first time into a furious blast beat, and finish off the track thrashing blackly, but even that brief burst is not enough to hide their true sonic soul, the whole track is rife with mathiness, with soaring majestic post rock-ness, just wrapped in a bit of blackness.
None of this is meant to sound apologetic, not in the least, this is absolutely one of our favorite new records, metal, mathy or otherwise. We just wanted to give fair warning to the troo grim hordes out there, who might have been put off a bit by the dearth of true blackness. But for the rest of you, this comes highly recommended. If you ever dreamed about a black metal Polvo (and who didn't) or wished Deathspell had continued on their more post rock path, or if you just can't get enough of that metallic post rock, and maybe wouldn't mind if it sometimes got a bit blacker, well then this is definitely for you...
MPEG Stream: "Desolation Embraced"
MPEG Stream: "The Gales Scream Of Loss"

FEN Ancient Sorrow (Northern Silence) 12" 11.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
While ostensibly a black metal band, the UK's Fen, are so much more than that. In fact, take away the vocals, and in a blind taste test we would have been hard pressed to describe them as black metal at all.
The sound is all loping rhythms, soaring chords, the sound majestic and epic, minor key and mathy. The first track sounds more like Isis or Pelican than it does Darkthrone or Deathspell. Well, actually, it does remind us a bit of Deathspell's most postrock moment, the genius Kenose. The band are described as 'atmospheric black metal / post rock' which would be a tad more accurate if you swapped the two descriptors. Even the riffs sound more like something off a Polvo or Pitchblende record, which is not a bad thing at all. In fact, we're a little bit obsessed with Fen. Another band whose sound is one we had always sort of wished for. Nineties math rock black metal! It's really uncanny listening to these three songs how often our ears catch a little Archers Of Loaf or Rodan or Don Cab or Bitch Magnet. And the thing is, the sound may be a bit heavier and more distorted, it's really only the vocals that turn this into black metal. If Fen were an instrumental band, they wouldn't sound all that out of place on Touch And Go. But they are heavy, and they are a bit black, and as if to prove it, the closer is the heaviest, and the least overtly mathy of the bunch. A plodding churning doomy chunk of loping blackened crush. And near the end of the 12+ minute track, the band even actually explode for the very first time into a furious blast beat, and finish off the track thrashing blackly, but even that brief burst is not enough to hide their true sonic soul, the whole track is rife with mathiness, with soaring majestic post rock-ness, just wrapped in a bit of blackness.
None of this is meant to sound apologetic, not in the least, this is absolutely one of our favorite new records, metal, mathy or otherwise. We just wanted to give fair warning to the troo grim hordes out there, who might have been put off a bit by the dearth of true blackness. But for the rest of you, this comes highly recommended. If you ever dreamed about a black metal Polvo (and who didn't) or wished Deathspell had continued on their more post rock path, or if you just can't get enough of that metallic post rock, and maybe wouldn't mind if it sometimes got a bit blacker, well then this is definitely for you...
MPEG Stream: "Desolation Embraced"
MPEG Stream: "The Gales Scream Of Loss"

FEN Epoch (Aural Music) cd 21.00

FEN The Malediction Fields (Code 666 / Aural Music) cd 17.98
First proper full length from these UK black metallers, who we once described as a black metal Polvo! There are definitely still hints of that here, but the metal this time around is also more furious. With the ep, we stressed that maybe troo grim metalheads might not find a lot to like, as much of that record sounded more like Pelican or Isis than Darkthrone or Deathspell, and even here, the first track begins with some post rocky clean guitar, but almost immediately launches into a seriously blown out squall of blasting buzz. But then a few seconds later, the band slip back into that loping post rock, only to again, explode into epic blackness. The track flits back and forth, and part way through there's even some Katatonia like clean vocals, which adds a definite pop element, and hints at what's to come. So, it's at once heavier and more black than the ep, but still manages to incorporate plenty of post rock rhythms and math rock arrangements, which basically makes this a massive favorite around here, but also means this is probably not black or brootal enough for some metalheads.
And since the opening track might just be the heaviest of the bunch, barring brief bursts here and there, this is the perfect record for the aQ metalhead, who when not enjoying true grimness, likes their black metal fucked up or freaked out or all shoegazey or all post rocky, which means odds are you'll dig this like crazy.
Much of the record follows the same pattern as the opener, long loping instrumental passages with simple drumming and clean crystalline guitars, peppered with bursts of frenetic riffing and wild blasting beats, but there's also plenty of strange haunting folkiness, bits of rainy day sad boy indie jangle, subtly complex math rock rhythms, all perfectly blended with chunks of intense riffery and buzzing black metal fury. And the thing is, the metal this time around IS way more furious, if you stripped out all the clean guitars and croony vocals, this would be some seriously paint peeling blackness, but those parts sound even MORE aggressive and heavy when butted up to some shimmery drift, or some jangly poppiness.
The closer is the other heavyweight here, nearly 12 minutes of roiling ultra heavy black metal, intense and frenzied, but still with plenty of loping midtempo grooves, occasional doom-ed out interludes, a brief flutteryfolky break, and a minor key string-ed outro, that manages to be super dramatic, and the perfect way for this strangely varied and super kick ass record to wind down.
Packaged in a super striking 8 panel digipak, and damn if Fen don't have one of the coolest logos...
MPEG Stream: "Exile's Journey"
MPEG Stream: "A Witness To The Passing Of Aeons"
MPEG Stream: "Colossal Voids"

FENN O'BERG In Stereo (Editions Mego) cd 17.98
Fenn O'Berg is the on-again / off-again collaborative project between Christian Fennesz, Jim O'Rourke, and Peter Rehberg, who had made their last splash into the realm of glitched-out electronics back in 2002. All three of these artists have involved themselves in various laptop improvisational ensembles with sporadic success (certainly nothing as wondrous as their individual solo recordings), and the previous two Fenn'O'Berg albums were simply spliced collages of live presentations. In Stereo was recorded in Japan over a couple weeks, entirely in the studio. There's a bit more of a structured sentiment emerging from the perpetual motion of digital effects and obliterated samples, setting it apart from the earlier albums. There's plenty of Rehberg's wracked digitality, splattered through ring-modulated, time-stretched deconstructions and digital cluster bombs of pixilation; there's episodes of those amniotic, post-guitar washes that Fennesz has gracefully produced for years; and Jim O'Rourke ever the chameleon fits his multi-tasking production well within the poles of his collaborators. Amidst the pantheon of digital effects, the trio are not averse to working in analog tones, repetitions, and sweeps. The fourth track on the album (titled "Part I") begins with an interesting set of cylon drones before the trio unleashes a percussive frenzy of glistening piano and tumbling drums that could almost have come from an Alice Coltrane composition. Outside of this expressive outburst, In Stereo for the most part comes across as something of a kosmiche-digital-psychedelic hybrid that might fit between Klaus Schulze and Oval.
NB: The vinyl is out of print on this release (oh so quick!), but we might have one or two copies kicking around. Just ask, you might get lucky!
MPEG Stream: "Part III"
MPEG Stream: "Part V"
MPEG Stream: "Part I"

FENN O'BERG In Stereo (Editions Mego) lp 30.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Fenn'O'Berg is the on-again / off-again collaborative project between Christian Fennesz, Jim O'Rourke, and Peter Rehberg, who had made their last splash into the realm of glitched-out electronics back in 2002. All three of these artists have involved themselves in various laptop improvisational ensembles to sporadic success (certainly nothing as wonderous as their individual solo recordings), and the previous two Fenn'O'Berg albums had been spliced collages of live presentations. In Stereo was recorded in Japan over a couple weeks entirely in the studio. There's a bit more of a structured sentiment emerging from the perpetual motion of digital effects and obliterated samples, setting it apart from the earlier albums. There's plenty of Rehberg's wracked digitality, splattered through ring-modulated, time-stretched deconstructions and digital cluster bombs of pixelation; there's episodes of those amniotic, post-guitar washes that Fennesz has gracefully produced for years; and Jim O'Rourke ever the chameleon fits his multi-tasking production well within the poles of his collaborators. Amidst the pantheon of digital effects, the trio are not averse to working in analogue tones, repetitions, and sweeps. "Part IV" begins with an interesting set of cylon droning before the trio unleashes a percussive frenzy of glistening piano and tumbling drums that could almost harken from an Alice Coltrane composition. Outside of this expressive outburst, In Stereo for the most part comes across as something of a kosmiche-digital-psychedelic hybrid that might fit between Klaus Schulze and Oval.

FENN O'BERG Live In Japan Part One (Editions Mego) lp 21.00

FENN O'BERG Live In Japan Part Two (Editions Mego) lp 21.00

FENNESZ Black Sea (Touch) cd 15.98
Which came first Tim Hecker or Christian Fennesz? If one is to merely look at the discographies of the twin kings of digitally tricked out guitar sculpting, the chronological answer is obvious: Christian Fennesz. But in the four years that have transpired between his brilliant album Venice and the 2008 opus Black Sea, Fennesz must have seen a younger protege in Tim Hecker coming up in the rear view mirror with his own dramatic sound for smeared guitar whose beauty is similarly rendered through error. Not only does Black Sea feel like a response to Tim Hecker's work, it also stands as Fennesz' most fully realized album, perhaps even more so than the sunburst explosion of meta-pop on Endless Summer.
Fennesz works best in the cold, with ice, snow, and frost dusting the strings of his guitar and seeping into the circuitry of his computer; and the cold landscape is exactly where he situates himself on Black Sea. Not surprisingly, Touch's Jon Wozencroft perfectly matches a photograph of an abandoned train track set onto a barren wintry landscape, looking a hell of lot like the photographs that Anselm Keifer uses as a background over which he dumps tar, paint, cement, lead, ash, and whatnot into his alchemical paintings.
Black Sea opens with the fizzling crunch of digital errata getting mangled even further by digital means, with Fennesz sculpting a sea swell of a half melody in the distance. Considering the contemplative and cold nature of the rest of the album, this track is a bit discordant; but Fennesz isn't going for the Menche / Merzbow attack, just something of a wake-up call. But gradually, even this first burst of noise quells in a plaintive round of finger picking on the guitar, out of which a beautiful cloud of vaporized drone begins to amass and a subharmonic throb of distortion settles in. These sounds become the template for the rest of the album, all wrapped in gray, muted timbres. When noise bursts through Fennesz' circuits, the attack almost immediately blurs into clustered loops, drones, and sympathetic noises to smooth the edges into a shimmered glisten of remarkable beauty that exhibits a cold, overcast, and gray soundsmear, certainly on par with the sleepytime shoegaze of My Bloody Valentine. After an exceptional collaborative track with Rosy Parlane of lunar landscape ambience riddled with dust before opening into a hymnal melody, Black Sea comes to an end with one of Fennesz' best tracks ever in "Saffron Revolution," with its soaring vapor trail of tone-bent guitar drone and a majestic crescendo of sustained, soft focus distortion. A truly marvellous piece of work.
MPEG Stream: "Black Sea"
MPEG Stream: "Glide"
MPEG Stream: "Saffron Revolution"

FENNESZ Black Sea (Touch) lp 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Now available on vinyl, this recent Record Of The Week!
Which came first Tim Hecker or Christian Fennesz? If one is to merely look at the discographies of the twin kings of digitally tricked out guitar sculpting, the chronological answer is obvious: Christian Fennesz. But in the four years that have transpired between his brilliant album Venice and the 2008 opus Black Sea, Fennesz must have seen a younger protege in Tim Hecker coming up in the rear view mirror with his own dramatic sound for smeared guitar whose beauty is similarly rendered through error. Not only does Black Sea feel like a response to Tim Hecker's work, it also stands as Fennesz' most fully realized album, perhaps even more so than the sunburst explosion of meta-pop on Endless Summer.
Fennesz works best in the cold, with ice, snow, and frost dusting the strings of his guitar and seeping into the circuitry of his computer; and the cold landscape is exactly where he situates himself on Black Sea. Not surprisingly, Touch's Jon Wozencroft perfectly matches a photograph of an abandoned train track set onto a barren wintry landscape, looking a hell of lot like the photographs that Anselm Keifer uses as a background over which he dumps tar, paint, cement, lead, ash, and whatnot into his alchemical paintings.
Black Sea opens with the fizzling crunch of digital errata getting mangled even further by digital means, with Fennesz sculpting a sea swell of a half melody in the distance. Considering the contemplative and cold nature of the rest of the album, this track is a bit discordant; but Fennesz isn't going for the Menche / Merzbow attack, just something of a wake-up call. But gradually, even this first burst of noise quells in a plaintive round of finger picking on the guitar, out of which a beautiful cloud of vaporized drone begins to amass and a subharmonic throb of distortion settles in. These sounds become the template for the rest of the album, all wrapped in gray, muted timbres. When noise bursts through Fennesz' circuits, the attack almost immediately blurs into clustered loops, drones, and sympathetic noises to smooth the edges into a shimmered glisten of remarkable beauty that exhibits a cold, overcast, and gray soundsmear, certainly on par with the sleepytime shoegaze of My Bloody Valentine. After an exceptional collaborative track with Rosy Parlane of lunar landscape ambience riddled with dust before opening into a hymnal melody, Black Sea comes to an end with one of Fennesz' best tracks ever in "Saffron Revolution," with its soaring vapor trail of tone-bent guitar drone and a majestic crescendo of sustained, soft focus distortion. A truly marvellous piece of work.
MPEG Stream: "Black Sea"
MPEG Stream: "Glide"
MPEG Stream: "Saffron Revolution"

FENNESZ Endless Summer (Editions Mego) cd 16.98
Way back in the summer of 2001, we made Fennesz' Endless Summer a Record of the Week. Little did we know how influential the album would become, and how much of an impact it would have on the realms of the avant-garde and electronic music at large. Here's what we said with the linguistic aplomb of an era now past:
While the label that Fennesz calls home is certainly guilty of propagating a specific aesthetic (harsh digital soundscapes based upon the flotsam of cybernetic errata), Fennesz has always produced what we had imagined should be the salvation for experimental electronica -- an ever vigilant, but necessarily shifting search for balance. As Fennesz does incorporate the guitar quite a bit into his creative process, there is a finely tuned balance between rock and electronica archetypes. However, his egalitarian views of intention and execution, dissonance and melody, metaphor and metonym, structure and arrhythmia, analogue and digital, warm and cool, etc. are exactly what electronica needs.
Fennesz' third album -- the aptly titled Endless Summer -- picks up where his ep of Rolling Stones / Beach Boys covers left off with a digital dispersion of "fun in the sun" rock mythologies. While there are no obviously discernible pop culture references, Fennesz builds a sound that really is quite summery from odd duets between disintegrating acoustic guitar strums and the coalescence of digital errata. Thus, this album has the feeling of the classic Beach Boys sound, but very little of that structure. These are NOT Beach Boys covers; but if he said they were, we'd have no basis to call him a liar. Regardless, Fennesz's Endless Summer is a stunning record.
Repackaged with vastly improved artwork, and two extra tracks not on the original. One of which was from the Fat Cat split series of 12"s and the other being unreleased.
MPEG Stream: "Endless Summer"
MPEG Stream: "Happy Audio"

FENNESZ Endless Summer (Editions Mego) lp 27.00
This all time AQ favorite is finally available on vinyl again!
Way back in the summer of 2001, we made Fennesz' Endless Summer a Record of the Week. Little did we know how influential the album would become, and how much of an impact it would have on the realms of the avant-garde and electronic music at large. Here's what we said with the linguistic aplomb of an era now past:
While the label that Fennesz calls home is certainly guilty of propagating a specific aesthetic (harsh digital soundscapes based upon the flotsam of cybernetic errata), Fennesz has always produced what we had imagined should be the salvation for experimental electronica -- an ever vigilant, but necessarily shifting search for balance. As Fennesz does incorporate the guitar quite a bit into his creative process, there is a finely tuned balance between rock and electronica archetypes. However, his egalitarian views of intention and execution, dissonance and melody, metaphor and metonym, structure and arrhythmia, analog and digital, warm and cool, etc. are exactly what electronica needs.
Fennesz' third album - the aptly titled Endless Summer - picks up where his ep of Rolling Stones / Beach Boys covers left off with a digital dispersion of "fun in the sun" rock mythologies. While there are no obviously discernible pop culture references, Fennesz builds a sound that really is quite summery from odd duets between disintegrating acoustic guitar strums and the coalescence of digital errata. Thus, this album has the feeling of the classic Beach Boys sound, but very little of that structure. These are NOT Beach Boys covers, but if he said they were, we'd have no basis to call him a liar. Regardless, Fennesz's Endless Summer is a stunning record.
MPEG Stream: "Endless Summer"
MPEG Stream: "Happy Audio"

FENNESZ Field Recordings 1995:2002 (Touch) cd 15.98
Over the past couple of years, it has become apparent that there are two modes of production for the esteemed Austrian electro-glitch artist Christian Fennesz. On one hand, there are the studio driven productions where he focuses on the digital decomposition of various guitar signatures (exemplified within the "Plays" single whose beautiful cover of The Rolling Stones' "Paint It Black" was originally commissioned for the ill-fated "Painted Black" compilation -- due soon on tUMULt), and on the other, there's the live improvisation techniques he brings to any number of European free-jazz / new music ensembles (i.e. MIMEO, FennO'Berg, Polweschel, Golden Tone, Orchestra 33 1/3, etc.). While his technical prowess and expressive immediacy can be quite graceful on those electro-improv recordings, Fennesz excels in the studio.
"Field Recordings 1995:2002" -- which is NOT a collection of Chris Watson-esque field recordings -- picks up some of the studio driven scraps that had been released on compilations, special projects, and film soundtracks during the past 7 years. Of particular note, "Field Recordings 1995:2002" features all of the cuts from his amazing "Instrument" debut EP released on Mego in 1995. Even before such incredibly powerful programs as SuperCollider and Max/MSP had been as widely available as they are now, Fennesz has always been interested the atomization and disintegration of digital recordings at their most basic level. While all of these tracks from "Instrument" still sound great by today's standards, there is a strong connection with the sampledelica guitar trickery of '90s UK post-rock of Seefeel, Main, and Disco Inferno as hyperactive, time-stretched kaleidoscopes of post-MBV distortion and skittering electronica rhythms. The other tracks include reworkings of the soundtrack composed for "Blue Moon," remixes Fennesz did for Ekkehard Ehlers and Stephan Mathieu, and compilation tracks from "Decay" (Ash International), "RKKCD13" (Reckankreuzungklankewerkzeuge), "Clicks and Cuts 2" (Mille Plateaux) and "Krev X" (Ash International) -- that last contribution being a digitally fuzzed-out cover of America's "A Horse With No Name."
While many 'loose-end' collections run the risk of being full of cast-away tracks from the proper albums, Fennesz' "Field Recording" is as good as any of his previous albums, and shouldn't be missed!
RealAudio clip: "Instrument 3"
RealAudio clip: "Instrument 4"
RealAudio clip: "Surf"
RealAudio clip: "Name With No Horse"

FENNESZ Hotel Parallel (Mego) cd 16.98
Originally released in 1997, now finally available again, the debut full length from Viennese experimentalist guitarist Christian Fennesz. Long before the fuzzed out blurry sounds of folks like Tim Hecker and other DIY dronesters were everywhere, and the technology for processing sound was super readily available, Fennesz was a laptop alchemist, a guitar deconstructionist, transforming his axe into a strange sound making device, capable or producing the most gorgeous and alien of sounds.
Hotel Parallel is a lot different than later Fennesz releases. Where those were soft focus and sun baked, glistening and shimmering, Hotel Parallel is much darker, more abrasive, harder edged, the sounds much more intense and brutal, but without losing any of their beautiful mystery.Ê
Listening to this again now, it's kind of mind blowing to believe the sounds here are all guitar. From dense swirls of speaker clogging hiss, to glimmering Niblockian stretches of static high end blur, to tangled swirls of glitch and swoop, backwards fffffft and gnarled melody, to grinding low end chunks of sound, angular and abrasive, to barely there billows of whispery low end, streaked with muted melody, to epic My Bloody Valentine like cacophonies of distorted pop ambient almost house music to super minimal Chain Reaction throb and pulse. Some of these tracks sound like the recent Field record, or some of the more abstract Kompakt stuff, but this was 10 YEARS AGO! AND IS ALL GUITAR! How the fuck do all of these sounds come out of a guitar? Who the hell cares? An absolutely gorgeous breathtaking epochal work of guitar experimentation, that few have rivaled in the decade since...
This reissue is super swank, six panel digipak, printed in green on white with subtle spot varnish, it includes some extra stuff too, a bonus track from a long out of print 7" (limited to 100 copies) from 1996, a super beautiful droney blurry murkscape, and an absolutely breathtaking video, perfectly reflecting the sound of Fennesz visually, all glitchy and grainy and so gorgeous...
MPEG Stream: "Sz"
MPEG Stream: "Nebenraum"
MPEG Stream: "Blok M"

FENNESZ Il Libro Mio (TanzHotel) 3" cd 7.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
4 short compositions on an adorable little 3" compact disc by this brilliant electronica / guitarist from Vienna. Shards of processed guitar noise filtered into the tropes of musique concrete that end up sounding like a more active Achim Wollschied. Further on the composition, Fennesz allows the delicate strum of the guitar to infiltrate the barrage of noise, giving nods to John Fahey, but in a much more interesting way than the recent interpretations of Fahey by the Chicago post-rockers.

FENNESZ June (Table Of The Elements) lp 15.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Latest in Table Of The Elements' series of 'Guitar' 12"s, and this is the one everyone has been waiting for, Christian Fennesz' June. Hot on the heels of Black Sea, which was a recent aQ Record Of The Week, comes this single sidelong drift of gnarled guitars and pixelated soundscapes. But unlike the blurred beauty of Black Sea, June is something else entirely, a creaking, clanging, chiming post industrial landscape of processed guitars, rendered here in the shape of distant pulsing buzz, in shards of jagged chords ringing out and dissipating into the ether, and deep groaning waves of blackened Wolf Eye-d rumble, imagine even a super softened Blue Sabbath Black Cheer, this is less blissed out shoegazey dreamscapery, and more carving dark sonic figures from deep shadow, ominous, sinister, haunting, all words that most definitely apply to past Fennesz recordings, but usually those elements were lurking beneath a shimmery sun dappled exterior, a soft patina of whirling muted buzz draped over a roiling black sea of sound below, but here, those sounds are allowed to creep to the fore, creating a seriously dystopian chunk of cinematic black ambience, the guitars unleashing a murky black fog, that while lovely cloaks all the other sounds in a mysterious blackened grit, but it is Fennesz after all, so the corrosive crumbling darkness does eventually get smoothed out, transformed into into a soft, rolling, burnished shimmer, deep tones dreamily undulating and floating weightless in an expanse of hushed thrum, but by then, the track is winding to a close. Dark stuff from Fennesz, and we like it. A lot!
Pressed on super thick, swirled milky brown vinyl. One sided, the other side with an awesome etching by Savage Pencil, housed in a thick PVC sleeve, and of course, as always, VERY LIMITED!

FENNESZ Live At Revolver, Melbourne (Touch) cd 11.98
Austrian electronic glitch-guitar superstar Christian Fennesz does his thing in Australia, and this live limited edition cd (not cd-r, unlike other similarly plainly-packaged releases on Touch) is the documentation. "Live at Revolver" picks up where Fennesz' masterful "+47¡ 56' 37"" left off with rich buzzing tonalities forming melancholic almost-melodies topped with sporadic events of domestic clatter. A requiem for a microwave oven, perhaps? Nonetheless this may be for fans only, as it's not quite 17 minutes long! Still, this is recommended, as those 16 minutes and 34 seconds are quite good.

FENNESZ Live In Japan (Headz) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Live record from everybody's favorite laptopping guitarist (or guitar playing laptopper) Christian Fennesz, released on the new (to us at least) Japanese label Headz, in a gorgeous sleeve designed by Touch's Jon Wozencroft. A little over 40 minutes of gorgeous, squelching, hazy shimmer. The disc starts off with a burst of scratchy barbed wire static, before the submerged melodies and summery warmth slowly rise to the surface. As the disc progresses Fennesz's guitar surfaces more and more, as lazily strummed acoustic guitars dodge digital crunch, and fingerpicked notes are captured and sent careening wildly through the thick wash of digital whir, crackly sputter, and gritty fuzz. Moments of melodic tranquility bob weightlessly on a sea of crackling glitches and resonant flickers of crumbling distortion, as the melodies struggle to stay afloat. So completely lovely and at the same time so ferocious and harsh, a dichotomy of sound that seems to define the glorious sonic explorations of Fennesz.
MPEG Stream: "Live In Japan"