project_unknown - Undefined Static Forms Of Monotone Structures (Test Tube, 2011)

1 Untitled
2 Untitled
3 Untitled
4 Untitled

«This is project_unknown again (check out tube156) with more minimal crazyness. This time around, he's playing with monotone sound structures, repeated untill your head goes numb and gets into the rhythmic pattern like an ant follows a path of sugar. Monolake comes a lot to my mind when I'm listening to this EP, especially 'Untitled #1' which has a lot in common with the 'Gobi The Desert' period from the german electronic project.
To listen very very loud!»
Pedro Leitão

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Rolf Julius - Wind (Verlag Das Beispiel GmbH Darmstadt, 1993)

1 Sommerstück (Belèm) 31:26
2 Neues Klavierkonzert 29:52

Rolf Julius just passed away, i copy there a text from Airform Archives:

"when i went to a garden in okayama, a crane landed and suddenly gave a loud cry. i was surprised that a sound like that could exist. and then the silence afterwards: in complete harmony in the space. then i understood the beauty of japanese gardens."
rolf julius, 1992

life and death are certainly strange things. last weekend i picked up a copy of a recent cd release of rolf julius' music for the ears and small music no. 1 - both ecordings from 1979. on monday, i spent the entire day in the studio painting, with the cd repeating for about 10 hours. every time i took a break from painting, i sat and listened to these stunningly beautiful and simple works in their entirety, and i realized how much his work has always inspired me.

when i first started to make "sound art" i wanted to be rolf julius. the first time i met him, for a small festival in berlin, i ran into him in a hallway, where it had looked a bit like he had dropped a small suitcase on the floor and all of his gear had fallen out of it in disarray. he was standing there bent over looking at the small speakers, wires, and small cassette players as if reading a map. after standing next to him for a few minutes, i realized that sound was also present, barely audible, and that this was his installation. it was a wonderful first meeting, like being kids and looking for small colorful insect in the grass.

his work always had this natural feeling of happenstance on the surface, and then it started to work its immersive magic on you. it was the least pretentious work i've ever encountered - certainly more "lower case" in terms of its presence than i could ever achieve; and as an artist and human being this humility was also always present. he was incredibly generous to me, not only over the years that we exhibited together, but most importantly when i was just beginning, and he simply treated me like an another artist.

monday, immersed in these two early pieces of his, i spent a lot of time sitting and listening. at one point i went over to my desk and started to write him a letter, as i realized how long i had been listening to his work in its various forms, marveling at his drawings, his writings, and just how hugely inspirational his work has been to me - not only since the beginning of my making sound works, but continually, still, now. i wanted to tell him that his work was like a beacon to me - like the painters myron stout, alfred jenson, arthur dove, lee mullican, who always kick my ass and push me forward, julius' work is always there as a kind of measuring stick, something to live up to. unfortunately i never finished the letter.

these early works of his contain the core of everything he would do from that point forward, and i wanted to thank him for the continued tactile nature of his sound, its fragility, its presence and absence, its repetition and abstraction, but mostly its minimal presence and some undefinable quality of the organic and natural, as well as how composition too can be humble. so many times rolf called his work "small music" and it wasn't bullshit artspeak... he really meant it...

so, this morning when i received some emails of rolf's passing, my mind went to those little pieces i remember first hearing at e/static, small tea cups with little lids and tiny speakers inside - so one could sit with the object, and with the lid off the sound barely audible but constant, and then to place the lid on the cup to silence the sound. its a very sad day for sound art, and it is a very sad day for ears.

i hope anyone who is unfamiliar with rolf's work will use this sad day to discover his quietly magical world, and for those of us who were lucky enough to know him, i know we will all continue to be inspired by the works he has left behind. his sound works will continue to grow ever more present, while his physical presence will certainly be missed.
Airform Archives

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Christina Kubisch - Diapason (Semishigure, 2002)

01 Diapason 60:01

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Bosques De Mi Mente - Otoño (Clinical Archives, 2010)

01 Ahora son solo fantasmas, parte 1 - 5:45
02 Aun hay espacio para la luz en otoño - 5:03
03 Reflejo en un estanque - 3:03
04 Siempre estabas ahi para recogerme cuando caía - 2:58
05 Hojas al viento mientras paseamos - 1:02
06 Una caminata apresurada - 0:51
07 Un recuerdo atrapado en una esquina - 4:36
08 El vals de las marionetas rotas - 6:43
09 Tus pies corrian veloces por la arena - 2:28
10 Nos gritamos para no tener que escucharnos - 4:32
11 La historia se desvanece - 4:55
12 Círculos - 3:06
13 Berceuse macabre - 3:17
14 Todavia hay esperanza para las aves - 3:52
15 Lento - 4:18
16 El último juego entre las hojas al viento - 3:06
17 Un monologo atropellado - 2:06
18 Llévame lejos, lejos del ruido - 2:14
19 Para olga - 4:16
20 Jardín de estatuas - 3:32
21 Languidece la tarde - 3:32
22 Ahora son solo fantasmas, parte 2 - 4:41
23 Zeit - 3:30
24 La vieja iglesia camino al puerto - 5:04
25 Ahora son solo fantasmas, parte 3 - 2:52
26 Otoño - 2:56
27 Un reencuentro inesperado - 3:14

Otoño is an album of melancholic, intimist, minimalist music for piano. It has been recorded entirely of live improvisations, during 6 days of the fall of 2010, just as the music emerged from the forests of my mind to my fingers. It is an album of direct, sincere, quiet music to linger over. It is a double album of almost 100 minutes in length. I would like to thank Sergio Trujillo for recording some violins, and to Dobroide for some of his samples.
Bosques De Mi Mente

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Mirko Uhlig - Gyokuro (Gears Of Sand, 2009)

1 Do Birds 3:26
2 Practice 6:29
3 Their Songs 6:53
4 While They 7:43
5 Sleep 2:05
6 In The Gardens Of Gyokuro 6:27

The first EP we have ever released. We are typically very reluctant to release anything under an hour, but this intoxicating conceptual work of ambience by one of our favorite artists persuaded us to defy GoS conventions. On Gyokuro, Mirko Uhlig's 6 interconnected pieces comprise an admittedly short but no less realized composition that trigger thoughts of the tranquil, oxygenated tones of the more ambient works of Yui Onodera or even Celer; very minimal tones that are beautifully arranged to captivate the listener in a sea of field recordings and warm, lazy Sunday morning bliss. "Practice" presents a very catchy minimal motiff that begins to buzz and morph into a more abstract but no less enthralling evolution in the form of "Their Songs." "While They" shifts gears into a more haunting melody that recalls Milieu's "Beyond the Sea Lies the Stars" and then a full on symphonic wall of thick and warming cascades takes us deep, deep into finale, "The Gardens of Gyokuro." Mirko Uhlig once again shows his versatility as a sound artist who can craft very abstract, dark minimal compositions as in his recent Mystery Sea release, "The Nightmiller"- sprinkled far more sparsely here-to something unabashedly arcing and, indeed, ecstatic with "Gyokuro." Yes, this is audio ecstasy that conjures a most subtle and utterly sublime space that we find ourselves returning to often.
Mirko Uhlig

It has been remarked in the pages of Vital Weekly before, but the man to watch when it comes to producing some interesting drone music is Germany's Mirko Uhlig. Recently he did a 7" with [N], and already has a small catalogue of works (of which the great 'VIVMMI' will soon be re-issued on LP) and 'Gyokuro' is the latest in a series of these works. Again he works with relative minimal means to generate the pieces of music. An organ perhaps in 'In The Gardens Of Gyokuro'? That seems to be it. Maybe the processed bird call in 'Do Birds' (actually the title for these six pieces can be read as one sentence: 'Do Birds Practice Their Songs While They Sleep In The Gardens Of Gyokuro'). Uhlig knows how use a few sounds and still create a great piece of atmospheric music. And, you may ask, does it sound like anything else, or is it completely new? Well, no. In this particular line of music, nothing much new is done. That is perhaps also not the goal of this kind of music. Does it produce a great piece of music? Yes, it does. Whereas some of the current drone artists take too much time or use too much sounds, Uhlig knows how to play a few delicate sounds and set the tone right. Short pieces, each with their own character, yet as a whole, the album has a great distinct sound, an uniformed entity. Another fine work.
Vital Weekly

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Eliane Radigue - Geelriandre - Arthesis (Fringe Recordings, 2003)

1 Geelriandre 29:59
2 Arthesis 25:46

Pianist Gérard Fremy, in his liner notes - in French only, so you'd better invest in a good dictionary - recalls the story of the world premiere of Eliane Radigue's "Adnos" in the Musée Galliera, Paris, on November 10th 1974, an event at which all the important music journalists of the time were present, and not one of them wrote about. A kind of anti-Rite of Spring, if you like. Fremy seems somewhat baffled at the (non) reaction, but it seems clear that the reason for their silence was that they were confronted by a music that was literally decades ahead of its time. Back in the early seventies the first musicians who worked with ARP and Moog synthesizers were more interested in sci-fi bloops and swoops, but Radigue was one of the few composers (perhaps even the only composer) who recognised and exploited its potential for extremely slow transitions of pitch and timbre. Though she'd long been associated with the French musique concrète establishment through her work with Pierre Henry, her music revealed no apparent interest in Schaefferian solfège or the jump / cut aesthetic of standard slice'n'dice electronic music. Filing her away in the minimalism drawer might be inevitable, given her long association with various American institutions and enthusiastic champions of her music such as Phill Niblock, but the mystery and magic of Radigue's music occupies a twilight zone of minimalism between the static drone world of Young, Conrad and Niblock and the gradual process aesthetic of Reich and Glass. With the former, we're presented with great blocks of sound that occupy the listening space, redefining our perceptions of its architecture - the music itself is unchanging (until the often abrupt transition to the next drone), but we are free to explore its inner nuances; with the latter, once the process is set up and loaded, to quote Reich, it's more a question of following its gradual development, as musical material changes either incrementally (Glass's linear additive and Reich's later block additive processes) or at a regular rate (Reich's phase pieces). Radigue's elusive music sits squarely between the two perceptual worlds - it is forever on the move, albeit very slowly (try loading one of her pieces into some music software and speeding it up fivefold, and you'll be surprised), but constructed so meticulously that it somehow slips out of time: change is perceived as having taken place rather than taking place. However many times you listen - and this is music you will return to on many occasions - you'll probably never quite figure out how she did it.
The release (at last!) of these two works dating from 1972 and 1973 is another major event in the (re)discovery of Radigue's music, after Table Of The Elements' landmark triple CD issue of "Adnos" last year. "Geelriandre" features Fremy on piano, gently inserting beautifully poised sonorities into Radigue's seamless textures - John Tilbury's work with AMM comes inevitably to mind. Originally premiered in Paris in 1972, this particular recording was made in Amsterdam's Stedelijk Museum seven years later, and a few distant Dutch hacking coughs unfortunately manage to make themselves heard. "Arthesis", realised on a Moog synthesizer during Radigue's residency at the University of Iowa in 1973, is heard here in a recording of its world premiere in Los Angeles' Theatre Vanguard that year. It's utterly useless to describe either of these works: they simply must be heard to be believed. French musician and Metamkine label boss Jérôme Noetinger, who released Radigue's "Biogenesis" on his Cinéma Pour L'Oreille Collection a while back, has indicated that there remain several other pieces her early 1970s music that have so far not been released. It surely is only a matter of time: the world might not have been ready for "Adnos" in 1974, but thirty years later, Eliane Radigue's time has come. Anyone who seriously claims to be interested in new music simply cannot afford to pass this by.
Dan Warburton, Paris Transatlantic

In 2003, the small Italian label fringes, which had specialized in recordings of music on the farther edges of contemporary electro-acoustic improvisation, released the first disc on its archival sub-label: two earl- 70's performances by minimalist pioneer Eliane Radigue. It might seem an odd choice, but Radigue's steady-state, pulse and drone oriented works for synthesizer had cast a wider and wider influence over younger improvisers over the years, especially those concerned with the layering of extended tones and the unanticipated patterns that emerge. "Geelriandre," from 1972, created on the ARP synthesizer, begins with muffled bell tones nestled inside a drone that's just this side of harsh. Small sounds are added or removed over the piece's half-hour length, not through any strict system but rather intuitively, stressing the subtle placement of the notes within the drone-space, their sonic ripples the aural equivalent of pebbles tossed into a stream. At times, in its subtle complexity, the work comes very close to the sort of atmosphere generated by late AMM. It ends having, in one sense, traversed only scant territory; in another having opened huge vistas to explore. "Arthesis", performed the following year on a Moog synthesizer, largely dispenses with the personal flourishes and invests heavily in the essence of the drone itself, here a throbbing weave in which a given strand will occasionally rise to the surface and inevitably be subsumed, giving way to another. Choices are, of course, still being made by Radigue, but the overall effect is of experiencing some vast process of, for instance, leaning against the housing of an enormous generator, feeling its sounds and physical vibrations as one. It's ear-opening, invigorating music. Listeners who enjoy the work of practitioners such as Keith Rowe and Toshimaru Nakamura will be delighted at this possible antecedent.
Brian Olewnick, All Music

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Federico Monti - Polen II (CONV, 2010)

1 Polen II

Federico Monti (1973, Argentina) sound and audio-visual artist , based in Barcelona works with low frequencies, field recording , digital experimentation with sounds marked by musical ambience and experimentation.

His works has been published by Homophoni and Koyuki among others.

polen II

composed, performed, and produced by Federico Monti. Recorded in Barcelona 2007.
CONV

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Mirror - In To The Wood (Three Poplars, 2002)

1 In To The Wood 71:48

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Mirror - Solaris (IDEA Records, 2002)

1 Solaris 41:33

Andrew Chalk and Christoph Heemann, the core members of Mirror, have churned out countless expensive, gorgeously packaged LPs in highly countable numbers (typically under 400). The duo’s strategy has baffled me almost as much as it’s put me off, because their atmospheric music could easily find a much wider audience than the cabal of record collectors who are seduced by the bogus romance of self-imposed scarcity.

Solaris departs from Mirror’s usual MO; it’s their first CD (albeit one packaged in a lovely LP-styled sleeve), and it’s not a limited edition. The differences don’t stop there. Previously Heemann and Chalk have maintained a certain musical density and continuity by relying on drones, but Solaris is quite sparse; although it’s not improvised in real time, it sounds more like AMM than Thomas Koner.

Long clarinet tones, isolated prepared piano notes, and metallic reverberations mark a trail through the album-length piece’s empty spaces. Signal processing magnifies and warps individual sounds so that the woodwind sounds like a wind tunnel, tiny taps become echoing steps, and small scrapes become furry with static.

The change in material doesn’t lead to a diminishment of returns. Solaris goes beyond mere prettiness to sharpen one’s senses in a way that once again reminds me of AMM. Here’s hoping this record does so well that Mirror have no choice but to reissue their entire back catalog to the masses in all formats.
Dusted Reviews

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Jonathan Coleclough - Makruna · Minya (ICR / Siren Records, 2004)

1 Makruna 38:20
2 Minya 29:37
3 Makruna Coda 1:53

From all the UK drone meisters (I never understood why they are called 'meisters', but anyway), I think Jonathan Coleclough is one of the best, with a most diverse catalogue of music available. In this new CD, a split release between ICR and Siren, he offers two very lengthy tracks that take his sound a little bit further. Whereas
until now, much of his music was multi-layered aspects of similar sounds, here he extends his already richly layered sounds by multiple, different layers. In "Makruna" there is an ongoing deep, repeated bass sound, embedded in stretched out structures with, as icing on the cake, various field recordings of water and rain.
Changes are there, but as usual with this kind of music, the developments are slow. However, as said, Jonathan is a meister, and he knows how to keep the listeners attention and prevents from leaping into boredom. "Minya" is not unlike his older work, as here too he works with multiple layers of similar sounds, but unlike his
previous work, his sounds are more upfront, more present. Sharply mixed, with lots of attention for colour and detail. Quite a blast!
Vital Weekly

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Darren Tate - Formation (Fungal, 2005)

1 Formation 40:09

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Ryan Gregory Tallman - I Swore I Heard Snow (Isolationism Records, 2010)

1 Washed Iron
2 Sewn Danish
3 Hair Meadow

Ryan Gregory Tallman (b. 1977) is an electro-acoustic composer, noise artist, sound experimentalist, multi-instrumentalist and improviser. Tallman’s primary compositional focus is the manipulation and exploitation of the inherent resonant frequencies of acoustic spaces—rendering his work site specific and experiential. As a graduate from the Master of Fine Arts in Electronic Music and Recording Arts program at Mills College, Tallman studied under Fred Frith, Pauline Oliveros, Maggie Payne, Chris Brown, Roscoe Mitchell, and Zeena Parkins.
Isolationism Records

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Arnold Dreyblatt - The Sound Of One String (Table Of The Elements, 1998)

1 Nodal Excitation (Solo) 7:20
2 E-Bow Blues 3:07
3 Nodal Excitation (Excerpt) 4:47
4 March Of The Nodes In Formation 5:55
5 The Odd Fellows 4:22
6 Propellers In Love 10:47
7 Damping Influence 5:35
8 Die Luftmenschen 5:35
9 End Correction 6:50
10 Music For Small String Orchestra 13:43
11 Dirge Relations 5:14

Live and previously unreleased recordings: 1979-1991, including classic works like Nodal Excitation, Propellers in Love, etc. Dreyblatt's music focuses on the harmonic possibilities of stringed music and heightened sound awareness and this is an important and supremely pleasurable sound document of his works. Includes music for various combinations of prepared double bass, miniature princess pianoforte, hurdy gurdy, pipe organ, French horn, trombone, violin, percussion, electric guitars, electronics, cimbalom, tuba, voice, etc.

Arnold Dreyblatt is a major contributor to American minimalism; yet his efforts to date, like those of fellow composers Rhys Chatham and Tony Conrad, have been conspicuously underdocumented. The tracks compiled on The Sound Of One String range from early solo performances to digital studio recordings of Dreyblatt's full ensemble; together these comprise the first comprehensive retrospective of a remarkable, twenty-year career.
Table of the Elements

The Sound of One String may be (Dreyblatt’s) best album. It’s a collection of recordings from the late 70’s to the early 90’s, some solo, some featuring his group, The Orchestra of Excited Strings. Dreyblatt’s music is primarily concerned with the manipulation of various string instruments to produce ghost-like overtones and harmonics. The wide variety of instrumentation here (everything from e-bowed guitars to hurdy-gurdys to a conventional string ensemble) brilliantly displays the range and musicality of Dreyblatt’s sound experiments.
David Licht, Pulse

An expat composer, Dreyblatt has studied and played with Alvin Lucier, Pauline Oliveros, and LaMonte Young. His music is precise, gorgeous, and rich, based on the ringing, overlapping tones of droning, "excited" strings and other instruments. In his 19 years of making minimalist/maximalist music, Dreyblatt has only released three full-length works, each of which combines the visceral wallop of primitive rock & roll with the ethereal, glistening, timbral qualities of the finest orchestral string section. Fans of Phill Niblock, Tony Conrad, and the Deep Listening Band will be pleasantly excited by this collection of experiments, live recordings, and unreleased shorter works that include horns, percussion, a variety of prepared string instruments, and hurdy-gurdy put to exquisite, levitating use" Mike McGonigal

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Roel Meelkop - 9 (Holes In The Head) (Trente Oiseaux, 1996)

1 From How On
2 Espace Formé
3 Beweget, Bewogen USW.
4 Voor Judi
5 (Pittoresk)
6 Vergeten
7 Loch Im Kopf
8 Espace Fermé
9 Left What Where

Roel Meelkop's collection of electronic pieces follows very much in the Trente Oiseaux label tradition: very quiet pieces that avoid most kinds of traditional development, contenting themselves to present a few choice, sparse sounds. Most of the pieces here follow the same pattern of a quiet, drone-like background over which a series of sharply drawn events are scattered. The backgrounds vary significantly from piece to piece, and in appropriate listening environments, such as on headphones, present a tremendous amount of detail. On "(Pittoresk)," for example, the background is a barely controlled machine-like pulse, and on "Left What Where" it sounds like wind blowing slowly across a microphone. On a few pieces, such as "Bewegt, Bewogen Usw" and "Vergeten," the background becomes the piece, becoming accumulated in layers and slabs of sound. In a sparse environment like Meelkop's, the events become a focus of great attention. "(Pittoresk)" starts with small, electronic twinges that continue to reverberate until they combine with the pulsing background and explore into a single burst of feedback, the loudest point on the disc. Feedback also plays a significant role in "Espace Fermé," one of the most complex pieces here, where Meelkop produces a breathtaking sequence of low hums, rattles, and pops, making the listener think that the speakers have blown. A few pieces, such as "Voor Judi" and "Loch Im Kopf," have events that sound instrumental in origin, such as percussion or cello. Meelkop has been active in the European avant-garde scene since the mid-'80s, alone and in the groups Goem and THU20. This is his first solo release, although his Intransitive release, 6 (Mailcop Rules), presents a retrospective of earlier work.
Caleb Deupree, All Music Guide

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CEZAR - M. R.I. (Isolationism Records, 2010)

01 #0143
02 #0144
03 #0145
04 #0146
05 #0147
06 #0148
07 #0149
08 #0150

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Colin Andrew Sheffield - For Tomorrow (Bee Eater Recordings, 2009)

1 For Tomorrow 20:09

Colin Andrew Sheffield runs the Elevator Bath label, and as such he released some music by Pacione, and here he shows up on the Bee Eater label. Its a companion piece to a piece he did on a compilation for his own label and consists largely from processed church organ sounds. It starts like a massive block of sound and then over the course of the twenty minutes this piece lasts, he adds more and more sound effects (from the computer I assume) and then it seems to die out slowly. But towards the end the organs returns and that ending seems a bit superfluous, but it perhaps make sense too. The ending would have been a bit too much of a cliche and now it restores the order of the piece. Nice one...
Vital Weekly

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Aube - Aqua Syndrome (Manifold Records, 1997)

1 Refloatation 17:20
2 Aqua Syndrome I 6:51
3 Dilution 8:43
4 Aqua Syndrome II 10:21
5 Back Drift 10:27

All Composed Mixed Recorded And Designed By Akifumi Nakajima At Studio MECCA Kyoto Japan November 1996 To February 1997 Using Only The Sounds Of The Water As Source Material.

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Mirror - Nights (Three Poplars, 2001)

1 Untitled 2:11
2 Untitled 17:57

Sold Exclusively at the Chicago shows on March 30th & 31st, 2001.

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Oöphoi - Time Fragments Vol. 6 - Between Nothingness And Eternity (Umbra, 2005)

1 Meeting Rama 23:47
2 A Pale Reflection Of God 29:33
3 Le Monde Inanimé 8:57

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Oöphoi - Time Fragments Vol. 5 - Wastelands (Umbra, 2005)

1 The Deaf Birds Of Alpha Aleph 11:48
2 I Canti Di Babele 10:03
3 Mandala Glass 14:19
4 Praying Gurkas 11:55
5 Endless Rain On Altair IV 15:33

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