Release Date:
25 Feb 2022

Ⓟ & © 2022 KITCHEN. LABEL

ASPIDISTRAFLY, the Singaporean duo comprising April Lee and Ricks Ang, return with 'Altar of Dreams', their first studio album in a decade. 

While their last album 'A Little Fable' introduced the world to their bucolic and wispy brand of folk songwriting, 'Altar of Dreams' sees the duo – also the founders of KITCHEN. LABEL – harness their experiences over the past decade to create a wholly new and inspired vision. In this new and third album, they drew upon a rich palette of shapes, sounds and movement: straddling between the visionary photography of Serge Lutens and Dora Maar, 80s Japanese female ambient pop, musique concrete and the mournful strings of Béla Bartók. 

The world in which ASPIDISTRAFLY once inhabited was foggy and awash in faded memory. A feeling of being suspended in time felt inescapable with each listen. In 'Altar of Dreams', the fog is clearing up. At nine songs under 35 minutes, the album possesses all the defining hallmarks of ASPIDISTRAFLY – poetic lyricism, cosmic introspection, lush strings, surrealism, tenderness and texture. But what was once seemingly inscrutable has now been explored with astounding clarity, the duo maneuvering through a space-time continuum with delicate leaps.

‘How To Find A Marblewing’, the opening track, is a heady sound collage of early internet sounds, film, anime, and chopped-and-screwed 90s J-pop. It’s a presence deeply embedded throughout the record, a method Lee describes as “a form of environmental/tape treatment”. 

The compositions glimmer with sincerity, addressing all at once destruction, mystery, uncertainty, hopes and dreams. The resulting music is backed by an opulence only possible with a line-up of guest musicians. ‘The Voice of Flowers’ is stirring in its balance of flute, clarinet, tenor saxophone and piano, bolstered by a string quartet. KITCHEN. LABEL artist haruka nakamura features on the track alongside Kyo Ichinose (who arranged the strings for the album) and wind instrumentalist ARAKI Shin.

‘Interlude: Chrysalises and Larvae’ takes the heavy path downward, adopting its name from the 1973 surrealist odyssey The Hourglass Sanatorium. It leads into ‘Companion to Owls’, a gothic pop paean to mortality inspired by the Book of Job. 

Before the namesake centrepiece of the album, another interlude arrives in ‘A Ceremonial Ode’, both of which were stirred by a series of regal Shiseido ads from the 1980s starring model Sayoko Yamaguchi. ‘Altar of Dreams’ is haunted by the lucid dreams that once provided escapism for Lee. Its tranquility belies a simmering tension, just as how a lucid dream would offer control in the face of the unknown. “In one of them, I was floating in a vast darkness safe and secure, and then I fell into a turbulent mirage where I willingly allowed myself to be swept away further and further from reality, hoping that I would never wake up,” she says. “Needless to say I did, and ended up writing this song on one of these dead nights.” 

If the title track replicates the feeling of falling deep into that spiral, ‘Silk and Satins’ is a direct analysis of the phenomenon. Warped frequencies collide with nature and television sound effects – the latter sourced from 80s Singaporean horror series Mystery – within an inter-dimensional music world. The track was made with featured artist SUGAI KEN, whose own work is an endless scroll of intoxicating found sounds. 

‘Quintessence’, the sweeping closing track, distills all the elements scattered across the album into a coda that beautifully refuses to resolve. At first an exercise in guitar looping, the song was then written without a beginning and end in mind. “I’d like to think of it as poetry that’s sung,” says Lee.

In 'Altar of Dreams', ASPIDISTRAFLY are renewed and hopeful. They’ve emerged from a decade spent reframing the world they see through vivid dreams and memories. Now, it’s all yours to experience.

Altar of Dreams

ASPIDISTRAFLY - Altar of Dreams (Altar of Dreams, 2022)

From Album "Hope you are Wells" (epcd 082)
"7e.p. presents 7solo - Vol.6"
2014/12/10 on sale (7e.p. Online store 11/27)

more info : www.7ep.net/item/epcd082/

Tenniscoats / Singleton

Be gentle with your heart. Listen to the rain.

Tenderhearted Raindrops

B-side from Wallflower's single, "Nowhere" on Fastcut Records (FCEP-025)
released 6/24/17

Wallflower - Nowhere (Ice Choir Remix)

110515 (tsuji naoki "tooriame" remix)

Tracklist:
01. EVENFALL
02. OBSCURE DUSK
03. SINUSOIDAL PIRR
04. SOLEMN SOLACE
05. NIGHTFALL
06. INTERMISSION I : HÆTU
07. ETHEREAL COSMOS (ft. Okamotonoriaki, Kent Lee)
08. ANDROMEDIDS
09. COSMIC INFLATION (ft. Flica)
10. INTERMISSION II : ARÊTE
11. DAWNFALL

EVERY SINGLE DAY, OUR LIVES REVOLVES AROUND A SPIRAL OF SYSTEMATICAL LOOPS OF ACTIVITIES THAT SEEMS TO STATE OUR EXISTENCE IN THIS EARTH. THE MUNDANE DAYS AND ROUTINES THAT WE ENDURE AWAITS THE ARRIVAL OF THE WEEKENDS, WHERE WE SEEK COMFORT AND REST. THE CYCLE REPEATS TO FULFIL ONE GOAL AFTER ANOTHER, WHICH WILL LAST THROUGHOUT THE YEAR. WE CONSTANTLY SEEK FOR LOVE, FILLING THE EMPTINESS INSIDE WHENEVER IT COLLIDES WITH SOLITUDE. IN THIS DAY AND AGE, IT IS INEVITABLE THAT SOCIAL MEDIA AND MATERIALISM HAS OFTEN PLAYED A PART IN THIS FACADE TO SHELTER OURSELVES FROM THE ABYSS OF THE INSECURITIES SCREAMING FROM WITHIN. AMONG ALL OF THESE CATASTROPHIC SELF-SEARCHING EVENTS, YET IRONICALLY AT TIMES A BLESSING IN DISGUISE, WE FIND OURSELVES SEEKING FOR SOLACE

And like anyone of us, a Korean born musician, Dae Kim fnds his comfort in his frst LP, entitled Solace. In the midst of his soul-searching voyage, it has occurred to Dae that there is no other way to fnd comfort in life than fulflling one’s mandate, which in this case for him is by making music. Just like the mechanism of nature in this earth, every element took place to serve its core purpose. Hence, throughout this album, Dae was able to portray his perspective of this expedition through a soundscape of the living world. The three main themes entitled “Evenfall”, “Nightfall” and “Dawnfall” acts as a mould to the album with it’s looping melody lines and thematic structure.

Working for more than two years for his album, Dae Kim has took the approach of combining acoustic instruments from rhodes, piano, guitars, accordion to analogue synthesisers and turntables to create sounds of many colours. After spending countless nights in his bedroom drafting from one melody line to an ensemble track, he was fearless in trying new sounds and arrangements. With a mixture of electronica, ambient and acoustic, he was able to create songs that carries strong messages with a heartfelt innocence. As you could find the profound usage of these instruments throughout the album, it is hard to deny that Dae’s core inspirations such as Vangelis, Ennio Moricone and A winged victory of the Sullen (just to name a few), has played a part in shaping the overall soundscape of this production.

Playing a signifcant part in bringing this album to its fruition, is a strong line-up of musician collaborators. Bassist Kent Lee has showed his ability as a versatile musician through songs like “Obscure Dusk”, “Solemn Solace” and “Hætu” which carries the weight of the album’s theme between its heartwarming bass lines. He also did an additional composition for the seventh track, providing the drive and thrust for the song. Besides that, renowned ambient/electonica musician, Flica added an eccentric touch to the track “Cosmic Inﬂation” with his overdrived keys and alluring melody lines. It is as though in the midst of these indentation, there is peace and calmness. Last but not least on the featured artist is the Japanese born composer, Okamotonoriaki. Through his simple and benign repetition of vocal and harmonies, Okamotonoriaki was able to bring forth a sense of resolution through his work on the track “Ethereal Cosmos”. The album was mastered by Chihei Hatakeyama from Tokyo, who brought the entire album to it’s life and fruition.

“Solace” is Dae Kim’s journey of fnding his comfort amongst his vagrancy and it has been a rewarding one thus far. In this 52 reminiscing minutes of music, it stands for something more for the listeners. A time to reﬂect or a moment of catharsis, it is Dae Kim’s biggest hope for everyone who stumble upon this album to fnd their own solace amidst the pandemonium of our generation.

Solace

mnc018

Solace / Dae Kim (album sample mix)

Singer songwriter Rima Kato interprets hundred-year-old works by Victorian poet Christina Rossetti on upcoming album Sing-Song. 
Filled with toy instrument daintiness and folk guitar bounce, what began as a retreat away from the world is a refreshing, pastoral bridge through time and space, connecting listeners with the words of Rossetti herself.

Rima Kato - A Ring Upon Her Finger

小さな巨人 (LITTLE BIG MAN)

[ARTIST] Morningwhim (@morningwhimband)
[TITLE] Most Of the Sun Shines
[LABEL] fastcut records
[CATALOG NUMBER] FCEP-030
[FORMAT] 7"
[RELEASE DATE] 18th April, 2020 (RECORD STORE DAY)
[PRICE] 1,500 yen (without tax)

TRACKLIST:
A. Most Of the Sun Shines
B. Wandering

Morningwhim - Most Of the Sun Shines

Tiny Movements

Can you see it now?
What's lost along the way.

Do you hear them now?
Cutting through the noise.
Clear as daylight,
easy come, easy go.

Like an earthbound kite,
tangled in the wind.
Hurry and untie me,
send me on my way. 

Dean: Drums, Shakers and additional Toms
Leslie: Acoustic Guitar, Voice
Sean: Voice, Acoustic Guitar
Victor: Bass and Glockenspiel, Tambourine and Vibraslap

All songs written and composed by Hanging Up the Moon
Drums recorded by Victor Low at Affixen
Mixed by Victor Low
Produced by: Victor Low and Hanging Up the Moon
Mastered by: James Plotkin

02. Tiny Movements

Well, it is April.

following:
free download http://goo.gl/IZIJq
