Downbeat | Electronica | Leftfield 218 Items

A duo can be the most magical of things, and it seems like the meeting of minds between Morr Music veteran F.S.Blumm and contemporary classical darling Nils Frahm was a match made in heaven. The ease in which they perform together is the first noticeable thing on ‘Music for wobbling Music versus gravity’ – there is a discernable weightlessness to their sound as they circle around each other, moving and meeting, touching with their musical fingertips.

New music from Simon Green aka Bonobo is always an event, but when it heralds the arrival of a whole new album (his first since 2013’s “The North Borders”), it’s really something to get excited about. The masterful, magisterial “Migration” is Green’s sixth album and it’s a record which cements his place in the very highest echelons of electronic music and beyond.
It might be difficult to imagine it, but “Migration” will take his beautiful, emotive, intricate music to an even bigger audience. “My own personal idea of identity has played into this record and the theme of migration,” Green explains. “Is home where you are or where you are from, when you move around?” The personal, it seems, can also be universal.

From Detroit techno and hip-hop's early sampling experiments to Terre Thaemlitz, electronic music has long proven its political potential, even in instrumental form. With "OstWest", Berlin-based electronic-kraut-dub trio Automat complete their LP trilogy with a deep and entrancing take on the failures of neoliberalism.

Five years ago Sven Kacireks released his legendary album “The Kenya Sessions” on Pingipung. The drummer's collaboration with musicians from Kenya connected electronic, instrumental and field recordings in a unique manner and received kudos from various scenes between techno and world music. For the fifth anniversary Kacirek delivers two more songs with previously unreleased material: The Kenya Encores.

Idee 1', published (but never released) by Team in February 1972, is filled with experimental sparks, staggering orchestrations, breakbeat, funk, mournful atmospheres and world music influences.

Beautiful Deluxe Artwork, Limited ot to not to is an experimental RnB project by VA native Ian Mugerwa that combines low fidelity electronic recording techniques with unconventional song structures to produce music that serves as homage to dusty old blues recordings. At 19, Ian left his hometown of Fairfax for Richmond, where he slept on friends’ floors for several months while recording Goshen. During the day he would “hunt dussy” and during the night he would haul borrowed equipment over to the VCU music facilities and record until the morning. He was moderately successful on both fronts. The resultant recordings form a coming of age album, a snapshot of Ian from the ages of nineteen to twenty. Ian’s goal was to explore new aesthetics in black music through use of nontraditional methods, creating less polished, less sterile RnB in the process. Such methods included layering 40+ cello tracks to create the illusion of an orchestra, or collaging four, separate, 4-minute tracks of improvised percussion into one. Most drums were recorded last. Despite the focus on experimentation, it was important to Ian that he be crafting pop music. It is his belief that an impactful artist has, at least to some degree, a moral responsibility to deliver their art to the maximum amount of people (to efficiently help art as a whole progress). In other words, if restraint can be exercised, it ought to be. Similar artists include James Blake, Phil Elvrum, Mark Hollis, and D’Angelo.

The first-ever dedicated album release by pioneering female Italian film music composer/arranger/multi-instrumentalist Giulia De Muittis (aka Mrs. Alessandro Alessandroni). Rare undercover pseudo-ethnological studio sessions made under her experimental alter ego Kema (The Pawnshop/Abnormal Sensations) combining the ethos of Can’s Ethnological Forgery Series (EFS) with the studio trickery of Delia Derbyshire and unshakable credentials as one of the founding figures of Giallo film music and Italian psych soundtracks.

Perhaps best known amongst fans of Italian production music and Giallo movie soundtracks as the wife of the legendary Alessandro Alessandroni, composer, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Giulia De Muittis was an equally formidable force who emerged from the formative years of the aforementioned anti-genres and rose to a monarchic status within the country’s vibrant, and seldom rivalled musical secret society. The cliché “behind every successful man, there is a strong woman” might not do Alessandro and Giulia’s long-running creative unison justice but one thing that rings true that in the shadows of Senor Alessandroni’s limelight (illuminated by his work with Ennio Morricone for the films of Sergio Leone and Dario Argento) remained a darker musical feminine force which in time has come to represent the duo’s finest and most sought after sonic artifacts. In a career that spanned four decades until her untimely death in 1984 Giulia’s collaborative work as a reliable creative all-rounder and pop polymath has stood the unshakable test of time like few other musicians resulting in projects like The Pawnshop, Femina Ridens, Revolver, Questo Sporco Mondo Meraviglioso, The Night Evelyn Came Out Of The Tomb, Angoscia, Inchiesta Giudiziaria and Witchcraft ‘70 (Angeli bianchi Angeli neri) earning increasing “Most Wanted” status on the collectors’ market. It is of no coincidence that Giulia’s nom de plumes, Kema and De Muittis, have in recent, more educated years, become trusted seals of approval which connect top choice composers such as Raskovich (aka Sorgini), Stelvio Cipriani, Morricone, Braen (aka Alessandroni) Amedeo Tomassi, Piero Umiliani and Bruno Nicolai amongst select others. It is, however, De Muittis’ seldom heard self-initiated solo work for small independent Italian library music imprints that reveal a unique multi-instrumentalist female composer working at her most intimate and uncompromised best.

Limited edition of 300 copies on orange vinyl!

In the span of just over 5 years, Rob Orme hast released 5 individual EP’s and a full length LP with Project: Mooncircle. Due to high demand and the fact that all of his releases are out of print, we decided to release “works”, a best-of compilation with some of his best and most prominent works, including 4 entirely new and unreleased songs.

“A collection of works created between 2011-2016. The tracks sum up where I’ve been at for these last 5 years. It’s a checkpoint. It represents many influences and the way things were for a period of time. For me personally “works” are memories.” – submerse

Industrially minimalistic, generously coherent & truly acidic LP in the vain of techno, EBM & true underground electronic music. Dark droned ambience and skeletal rhythms but also beautifull and trippy pieces spaceously cut for sonically heavy playback on soundsystems & home stereos. From the rigid & non-confirmist ideology of General Elektro & Sex Tags Mani

This is the next installment of Rex Ilusivi archive uncoverings. This time it’s a live concert from SNP (srpsko narodno pozoriste / serbian national theatre) in Novi Sad, Serbia. Again it's a sublime masterclass in layering and mixing from the much revered King Of Illusion.

Peter Zummo (born 1948) is an American composer and musician. He plays the trombone, valve trombone, euphonium, synthesizer, other electronic instruments, and also sings. He is associated with the postminimalist and Downtown aesthetics, and he describes his music as "minimalism plus a whole lot more." He’s well-known for his work with Arthur Russell.

‘Beautiful People’, the lead track from Mark Pritchard’s latest and critically acclaimed album ‘Under The Sun’ gets a 12" relase!

After These Hidden Hands re-surfaced earlier this year with the collaborative single These Moments Dismantled featuring Lucrecia Dalt, Tommy Four Seven and Alain Paul a.k.a. Shards are set to release Vicarious Memories, their second full length LP, on August 8th 2016. Vicarious Memories builds substantially upon the sound forged with their debut album and brings a considerable new level of detail, complexity, and musicality, which ranges from flowing mellifluous grooves, somber drones, to the outright bizarre and unexpected. Although loosely an instrumental electronic album, the album makes extensive use of guitar and vocals and features prominent guest vocal contributions from underground Berlin based musicians Julia Kotowski and Ale Hop. The album’s preceding single, SZ31X71, a track which features on the LP is out July 11th, featuring a remix by revered Tri Angle artist, Roly Porter. Vicarious Memories will be released via the group’s own imprint, Hidden Hundred available both digitally and as a 12? vinyl LP featuring gatefold cover art by Norwegian illustrator Anders Røkkum.

Latency 009, from Tokyo serves us four eerie, multi-rhythmic, bass-heavy excursions, with roots in abstract hip hop and the classic D ‘n’ B of Photek and Source Direct.

‘The Aura‘ and the belief in it can be found in almost all cultures in one form or another. Often signifying fields of energy and spirituality, an aura is a luminous radiational halo surrounding a person or object. It is said that all objects and all living things manifest such an aura. In other respects the aura has also been described as a map of the thoughts and feelings surrounding a person.

Pieced together from sounds and samples from all over the globe, the album’s aim is to charge listeners with harmony and a feeling of connectedness to the world. Reflecting on his own attitude towards life and the importance of inner balance, Pavel attempts to share some of the spiritual experiences he made while traveling.
The lengthy process of creation included numerous reworks of each track and intensive listening sessions in order to keep the balance between the essential details and those that are redundant to the album’s atmosphere.

The album includes collaborations with old friends like Mujuice, Graciela Maria as well as some newly added artists – L.A. rapper BLU, Starving Yet Full – ex-vocalist from Azari III and Mitia Dedoni, who created the haunting album cover.

‘The Aura‘ comes out worldwide on limited grey-marbled vinyl (including download code).

Musiche di L.u.c.a. Produced and written by Francesco De Bellis L.u.c.a. is Francesco De Bellis aka Francisco. Years ago he started putting together some selections for a friend of his: Luca. The intention was to pick songs to be played during car rides, and like any other kind of ritual, this too would come with strict rules. You’d have to go throw the whole selection of 100 tracks without skipping, because every single one was important. Be it the sounds, the arrangement or its creativity, each track was there for a very specific reasons. It quickly became a monthly event which for several years evolved in a deep musical research without genre boundaries: Disco and psychedelic, soundtracks, library music, exotica, electronic and dance music, italo, new wave, pop or prog. Tracks of each and any historical period and provenance had been featured in this special compilations. But it wasn’t always that easy to come up with the right piece and eventually Francesco started producing a few on his own to fill in the gaps. After six tracks, it was quite clear that there was a project developing, one in which he could finally experiment freely, leaving behind the rules that often come with dance tracks. Of course, no name could have been better than the one of his friend that had inspired everything? And so L.u.c.a was born. Now, while preserving the same mind set, L.u.c.a is back with an album that embraces a new-hippie vibe, strongly pervaded by a mystical naturalism. This is a whole new universe in the making, where rumbling magmatic atmospheres evolve gradually in a journey through an idealist new world, celestial interludes revealing a full take over of nature, with a pervasive library feel that dates back to the great Italian masters, carrying on Edizioni Mondo’s legacy.

Charbel Haber is a Lebanese musician, performer & composer from Beirut. Co-founder and member of longstanding Lebanese post-rock group, scrambled eggs Haber’s work encompasses a wide range of disciplines and styles such as film, video art and theatre, both as a solo artist and as a member of Scrambled Eggs, Malayeen and Johnny Kafta anti vegetarian orchestra.

Gonzo is the ''why so serious?'' moniker of musician, DJ and discrepant head honcho, Goncalo F. Cardoso. Since starting the label back in 2010 gonzo has released a series of limited collage tapes on the label, “Dies Irae” being the very first one back in 2012. He now decides to give it the vinyl treatment with specially commissioned artwork from Belgium artist, Elzo Durt. “Dies Irae” (aka Latin hymn sung in a mass for the dead) explores the themes of religion, sects, cults and judgement day. It unapologetically stitches together field recordings, sound generators, random loops and 'unfinished' compositions to accompany weird spoken word moments or uncorrectable views and opinions. It kick started the self-penned Gonzo collage style and whether you like or not he's been at it ever since. Featuring spiritual leaders, enlightened gurus, cult leaders and good old fashion lunatics. Guest appearances by Jim Jones, David Koresh and Harold Camping among others. Iain Chambers plays guitars when you hear one.

First split LP in a brand new series of collaborations, pairing artists working on the fringes - or not at all. This first split pairs Brighton’s Blood Stereo's tape “Gonk” with Hair & Treasure's “Farm Life Loops”. Blood Stereo are Dylan Nyoukis and Karen Constance, a British institution, the sound complete immersion for people who don't immerse easily. Idiot twins Burchill and Slim may behave as though they own Sussex, but Constance and Nyoukis are immune to their surroundings, making livid eyes at confused glitter vixens up and down this squalid isle. Hair & Treasure are Alex Jones and Goncalo F. Cardoso, a prankster randy dust duo from nowhere dwelling on tape loops and webbed finger piano ballads. The material was pulled from a mound of who cares electro-acoustic improvised sessions as an offering to the associated deities of the zwieback buttermilk trade.

Conversation Sur Lettres Mortes is a conceptual album revolving around the relationship between Berlin’s Jesse Osborne Lanthier & Grischa Lichtenberger and the archaic apparatus of old cathode ray televisions and VHS units. It was first conceived as a live project for the Mutek/Elektra festival 2014 at the MAC in Montre´al, QC Canada, and now lands heavy on Cosmo Rhythmatic - the label curated by Shapednoise.

It is a fundamental part of life that in order for something new to emerge, something old has to pass and give up it’s space and resources. This circulation between life and death is the source of everything beautiful. It is omnipresent in the whole of nature and all cycles of reproduction we know.

“Life is finite yet cyclical. It’s beautiful. I am inspired by nature, and of the growth within it, albeit temporary. But for me, as I said before, the finiteness of life is part of it’s beauty. So enjoy the moment.” – Barnaby Carter

The positive melancholy of ‘While It Still Blooms‘ is his testament to acceptance, creativity and simplicity.

‘While It Still Blooms‘ comes out worldwide on limited splattered vinyl (including download code).

Unreleased Neo Classic tracks by Max Richter. Hauschka, Johann Johannsson, Dustin O’Halloran, Sylvain Chauveau, etc. on Fat Cat's sub label 130701.

Probably the most anticipated follow up album in music's history featuring Danny Brown, MF DOOM, Father John Misty, Toro Y Moi, Jennifer Herremaof Roayl Trux, Biz Markie and so much more.

'Old Future Worlds' is the second full-length instrumental album from Danish producer Lord Akton.

For this release, Akton's inspiration was ignited by Northern European forests, ancestral thoughts, jazz legends and the idea of tomorrow.
Genre-defying, the sound can be described as "sample-based spiritual synth-electro".

Working with everything from vinyl to synthesizers, drums to guitars, samplers to Logic, Rolands to Rhodes, dreams to reality, coffee to herbs, Lord Akton seeks to capture the listeners’ attention and curiosity, as they embark on an infinite train ride through unexplored worlds.

33 minutes of otherworldly traveling.

Limited to 150 copies.

“Magenta Line” is the debut recorded offering from the Fox/Soper Duo, consisting of New York City musicians Greg Fox on drums, and Ryan Soper on modular synthesizer. Soper, an inventive sculptor, video artist, and modular synthesist makes up one half of the NYC-based performance project Non-Native, and is also a member of the A/V trio Brat Pit. Fox is a prolific drummer known for his work in experimental metal outfit Liturgy, as well as bands such as Guardian Alien and Zs, not to mention countless collaborations ranging from Colin Stetson to Dan Deacon to Hieroglyphic Being. On “Magenta Line”, the duo takes on a form that is unexpected for an acoustic-meetselectronic style collaboration. Fox’s drums are slightly filtered and engineered to take on an alien, electronic quality that compliments Soper’s organic, expressive execution of his synth, to the point where the two styles meet in the middle to produce fierce and otherworldly results. For an instrument that manipulates purely electronic impulses, Soper manages to play it in an incredibly physical manner, buzzing, squealing, and roaring in all it’s distorted glory like an electric guitar. Fox’s ability to react and interact naturally with Soper’s synth is remarkable, and a rare feat that few drummers can effectively accomplish. The outcome of this fusion is a style that leans more towards industrial, punk, or metal than it does to jazz or modern improvisation. Unrelenting in it’s exploration, “Magenta Line” gives way to a new style altogether, yielding nearly 45 minutes of uninterrupted gritty and grinding cyborg thrash. Both artists demonstrate a very high level of skill and versatility with their chosen instrument. Fox and Soper each speak their own alien musical language to each other, meeting head-to-head in terms of the range of expression they can achieve with their expansive arsenal of mastered techniques. At times, Soper’s distorted sequences lock into place, providing the rhythmic backdrop for Fox to drum circles around, while at other times Fox lays down heavy, direct beats for Soper to explore the full range of free electronic shredding his synth is capable of. Musical form is firmly established, while extreme sonic and textural freedom is still allowed. “Magenta Line” is a marathon session where new ground is constantly being broken with powerful, crushing physicality. Although the instrumentation is unorthodox for an improvisational duo, the results are incredibly dynamic and exploratory when left in the hands of masterful musicians.

Limited edition of 300 copies on colored vinyl!

‘There Be Monsters‘, the sophomore full length effort by Samuel Evans, or Rain Dog, is an auditory exploration into the unchartered regions of his own mind and the edges of experience. Dealing with many personal changes which continuously prolonged the creation process of the album, Evans channelled and processed a variety of experiences into a highly personal album. Essentially coming full circle, ‘There Be Monsters‘ attempts to draw a map for your mind – it is on the fringes of consciousness that the interesting things happen.

David Foster Wallace wrote ‘loneliness is not a function of solitude’, paraphrasing Marianne More: ‘the cure for loneliness is solitude’. A common thread throughout the album.

After his highly acclaimed debut album “Two Words” in 2014 (BBC Radio 1, BBC Radio 3, BBC 6 Music, Boiler Room, Red Bull, Thump, XLR8R) Rain Dog comes back to deliver his sophomore full length ‘There Be Monsters’. Avoiding the plight of the second album and keeping his signature sound while also not repeating himself, the album is the result of years of work, scrapped previous projects and simplifying his writing process and gaining experience by creating soundtracks for Vice Documentaries. The track titled ‘Eyes On The Aether’ is representative of a turning point and each track has particular relevance to a point in Sam Evans life over the last few years.

‘There Be Monstes‘ comes out worldwide on limited vinyl (including download code).

There’s a myth about music critics that says we are frustrated, wannabe performers. Evidence to the contrary: Vivien Goldman. Ever since she migrated from pitching editors on the little-known music of Robert Nesta Marley to becoming one of the foremost chroniclers of the perfect storm of reggae, punk, hiphop and Afro-Beat, the London-born, New York-based Goldman has made documenting music her primary life work.

Music From Memory continue their 12” series with the release of an EP from St. Louis outfit Workdub, taking four tracks from across the groups elusive privately released albums; ‘Workdub I’ (1989) released on LP and ‘Workdub II’ (1992) which was a cassette only release.

Subtle killer grooves derived from Friedman’s outernational percussions & musics infected works.

Vigilant electronics and desolated soundscapes by Lundin Oil aka Abdulla Rashim with the first long player under this moniker. Ltd supplies!

CD Jewel Case. In 1975 I was doing a series of concerts in France with Lutz Ulbrich, where we were presenting "Inventions for Electric Guitar” and other compositions, which we developed together that year. In August, we were invited for two concerts in the South of France, one in the wonderful Roman theater in Arles, the other at the Festival Palace in Cannes.This is where we met the musicians of the German band CAN and the singer Nico, who also played at the festival. After the concerts we stayed together a few days in the beautiful city of Arles. Nico's friend, the French director Philippe Garrel, was working at that time on a film starring Nico, Anita Pallenberg and Dominique Sanda and was looking for music to make you dream. I always recorded most of our concerts, that's how we were able to offer him the piece that we had performed as "encore” in Cannes. It became the main theme of the film. Other parts were recorded during several sessions throughout 1975 in my studio in Berlin. Instruments and electronic devices were relatively simple compared to today's technology: four-track tape recorder, an old Farfisa organ, the beautiful EKO Rhythm Computer (Italian machines controlled by punched cards), the EMS superb guitar-Synthi HiFli and of course, our "usual” guitars. All this combined with the patching, the filtering and echo has produced its own unique sound to "electronic dreams” of the 70s. , Manuel Göttsching 1993 Recorded in 1975 at Studio ROMA, Berlin, with the exception of "Le Berceau de Cristal", recorded during the concert on August 7, 1975 at the Palais du Festival in Cannes.

Limited edition for Record Store Day 2016!

Discrepant presents Tiago Sousa's brand new LP with collaborations from Tó Trips, Ricardo Ribeiro, Balthazar Molina and Rebecca Roth.
Expect a unique work by one of the most interesting and intriguing musicians to come out of the burgeoning Portuguese music scene.

During the '60s and '70s, three distinguished gentlemen who had built their careers playing French-made exotic jazz (Roger Roger, Nino Nardini and orchestra leader Eddie Warner) met each evening in the Ganaro recording studio. They mainly experimented -or simply played- with keyboards that looked like prototypes of spaceships. Flying high on whimsical and joyful inspiration, the improbable trio used their strange instruments to sketch out the beginnings of something that, at that time, resembled the future of music. This collection presents some of the highlights that resulted from their light-hearted, electronic pop sessions.

Anthems for society's collapse that would appeal to both alt rockers with chock full Expedit shelves in LA & band weary oogles from Baltimore. From sea to shitty sea, this is controlled paranoia available for micro dosing, just drop the needle.

11 roomy, beatific songs rounded around Kyson's delicate vocal work.

180 gram vinyl!