Electro acoustic

The ASIP Places Series is a selection of releases inspired by the artist’s very own strangely isolated place. No one place is the same, no musical inspiration is identical. Everybody’s place of escapism is different. The Places Series aims to unearth the personal moments, the detailed sounds and the inspirational story behind the music, transporting the listener to that very moment of conception.

View all of the releases on our interactive Google Map http://asip.me/PlacesSeries

Download on Bandcamp

The Places Series

Inspiring

egarag erutuf

Train.

chill

Ambient.:-)Electronica:-)

Three short 1:00 solo piano pieces. 

Music composed and recorded by Keith Kenniff (aka Goldmund/Helios/Mint Julep). 

All rights reserved.  

http://www.unseen-music.com

Artwork by Aaron Cahill (NHGBRS) |  http://society6.com/NGHBRS

Mirrors 2

http://telltheband.bandcamp.com/track/vessel-in-vessel-stray-theories-rmx
free download- free album download at band camp

TELL... - Vessel In Vessel (Stray Theories Rmx)

*FULL PREVIEW*. The second of Kit's tracks to be remixed is the experimental beauty 'Three Dotted Monk'. What starts off as miniature clicks in the original, progresses into a euphoric electronica track riddled with field recordings and sharp beats. Norge takes a similar progressive approach, focusing on the driving nature of the original and adding Guentner'esque dubby ambience. These young stars of electronic music have a bright future ahead of them!

Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri.

Available as part of the Uncharted Places compilation: http://astrangelyisolatedplace.bandcamp.com/album/uncharted-places

Uncharted Places: Kit - Three Dotted Monk (Norge Remix)

Bones - Gravel (Feat. FiftyGrand)

Altiplano, Volor Flex’s effervescent collab with fellow Russian producer and good friend Encode, is yet another dateless - albeit state-of-the-art - immersion into the polyrhythmic, dense, visceral compositions that this prolific artist is constantly fine-tuning somewhere in the steppe of the Ural Mountains.

There’s a lot of synced up emotional comfort and tension happening on both sides of the release, balanced-out, as ever, by artfully crafted elements of structure and style. Among them, the everpresent UK garage signature, the noise-drenched soundscapes, the sharp snares, the skittering beats, the melancholy vocals (especially on Altiplano, which easily competes with You In Me or Fake Love in unforgettableness), plus those entrancing moments of fervor followed by profound relief that Volor is such a master of.

The main track and subsequently the EP were named after the highest and largest plateau in South America, and that’s how exalted and wide-reaching this music should feel. Both inner-city and otherwordly, both London and Syktyvkar, the 7-track, two-sided EP is going deep to get that right, raw vibe. The 12” comes with a wonderfully exciting digital perk, a sweet and soulful bonus track titled Avia.

Tracklist:
A1. Altiplano
A2. Unbone
A3. Entropy
B1. Frontiere
B2. Boring Apparatus
B3. Sidewalk
Digital Bonus: Avia

Volor Flex & Encode - Boring Apparatus

Trampique is Volor Flex's new alias. "Face To Face" is the 12-tracks long album best described by the man himself: 
"Trampik is this place in my hometown, where I go when I want to be alone. My close friends know that if I'm missing, they can find me there.
This album is about one year of my life. 2013 was very emotional and complex, each month has left a distinct print on my life. I had a lot of very difficult moments. I tried to translate them all into music. I made an album that describes this heartbreaking year." 

Out March 14 on Dark Clover Records.
Artwork by Nicolas Hansen 
Mastered by HIGH JET

Trampique - November

"Amps, Drugs, Mellotron" by Tim Hecker

Download this track for FREE at adultswim.com/singles beginning July 8.

Tim Hecker - Amps, Drugs, Mellotron

Daedelus - Onward

Produced by A. Darlington and Young Dad. Vocal by Young Dad.

From the forthcoming album "The Light Brigade"

Release Date: 09/30/14 

Buy - iTunes

Daedelus - Onward

Ashes

First single from the Floex album "Zorya". Out 26th September 2011 on Amanita Design &amp; Minority records! Free download from www.floex.cz

Credits:
Written and produced by Tomáš Dvořák.
Trumpetby Oskar Török.
Mixed and mastered by Matouš Godík.
Artwork by Veronika Vlková.


02 Casanova

From the album Zorya.  Mixed and mastered by Matouš Godík (www.zka4t.com). Released by Minority Records in cooperation with Amanita Design.

04 Precious Creature feat. James Rone

Taken from the album Zorya. Vocals by Marinella Mastrosimone (Musetta). Mixed and mastered by Matouš Godík (www.zka4t.com). Released by Minority Records in cooperation with Amanita Design.

09 Nel Blu feat. Musetta

From the album Zorya. Mixed and mastered by Matouš Godík (www.zka4t.com). Released by Minority Records in cooperation with Amanita Design.

11 Zorya Polunochnaya

Artwork by Martyna Zoltaszek
http://martynazoltaszek.com/

Buy on Juno

Adriano Konialidis -  Carnaval de Mi Barrio remix

A regular on one of our favourite label collectives, http://soundcloud.com/origamisound, Asger Bruun Hansen’s Places Series contribution comes somewhat out of the blue. If you’ve followed all of The Places Series releases so far, you’ll know by now that the inspiration for these tracks can come from anywhere and knows no boundaries – be they physical or musical. And http://soundcloud.com/oddshapes sound is leading the charge amongst his peers in defining a very unique approach to electronic music. Desert Plant is dark, mysterious and packed full of energy – a new, unexpected sound from the most unlikely of places.

Sometimes inspiration peeks out of the ordinary, finding you at a point where you least expect it. It doesn’t always have to be the flash of the Eureka! moment, just the growing creep of realisation and a willingness to look beyond the standard wash of the everyday.

“Sometimes I take a particular street, leading away from the city, when I walk. It has these old wooden sheds all the way down along one side and I was immediately drawn to this mysterious feeling, as if somebody was trying to hide something on this empty street with all these poorly constructed sheds,” Asger explains.

It’s a feeling that underpins the eerie dissension and mystery of ‘Desert Plant’. Humming with a dark tension, Asger’s field recordings of a busy city contrast against the desolate, rail track-guided path on its outskirts.

“The street is close to the rail track and at some point it becomes a path, which lets you cross under a bridge,” he continues, “under that bridge, I recorded these great low-frequency sounds – a mix of the cars going over and the wind blowing beneath the bridge, with the sirens and city noises contributing to the soundscape.

“As I went along the road, literally, the ideas started building up inside my head. I remember feeling like slowly returning to reality when walking back that day.”

Those field recordings create an angry dissension, the agitated whip of the wind interrupting the mournful call of the vocals, gnashing over the dead space between stabbing, percussive beats.

A track wired by dark and low frequencies, it feels like you’ve stumbled across a place where horrible things happen and are hid, the ghosts of those actions lingering only until they’re discovered.

“It’s called Desert Plant because of the place feeling like it was completely deserted, yet it offered me so much in the form of atmosphere and inspiration. There’s life but you have to find it, and acknowledge it.”

(Place introduction by Reef Younis)

More info and Bandcamp download: http://asip.me/ASIP020

ASIP020 Odd Shapes - Desert Plant

The somewhat eccentric notions carried in ʻTiny Nutʼ, through his trickling hi-hats and
descending basslines, creates a wonderful deep house exoticism, that you may find easy
to lose yourself in. Somewhere in the middle we find a jacking vocal cut bringing us from
under the trees for a brief moment in time. Earthy sounds make this track warm and
enticing, but donʼt assume itʼs not dance floor material, because it is!

Buy Vinyl

Antonio Olivieri - Tiny Nut (Original Mix) SNIPPET

10 Remi (Essáy Remix)

isolatedmix 33 http://soundcloud.com/heathered-pearls

1. Mr. Rogers Speech to Congress
2. KIDS Soundtrack - Second To Last Scene
3. Foxes In Fiction - Static Cults
4. Steve Hauschildt - The Impossible Flower
5. Yagya - Rigning Níu
6. Cuppcave - Circuit Fade
7. Pub - Derail
8. C V L T S - Realiser
9. The Sight Below - Unforetold
10. Piano Magic - Halloween Boat
11. Loscil - Coyote
12. Heathered Pearls - Raising Our Ashes
13. Solar Year - Currents
14. Boards Of Canada - Unknown

More info including tracknotes: http://asip.me/isolatedmix33

isolatedmix 33 - Heathered Pearls: In Memory Form

Free Download: https://sorrowgarage.bandcamp.com/track/21122012

Free Download HERE

Sorrow - 21.12.2012 (Free Download)

Some nights are made for sitting back and just letting the world spin on its axis; nights to watch the snow fall and gaze over misty neon hazes in the distance. Dark skies and white snow always seem to cast a sleepy contrast but it’s also one shared by an almost motionless state.

It’s times like these Benjamin Dauer treasures; the still hours where life is yet to accelerate towards its grinding daily regimen; the wait before the first creaks of cold bones and commuter trains amplify the city. 

“By day, I am a problem-solver,” Benjamin starts, “and each project comes with a slew of new requirements and problems. Things can move pretty quickly and before you know it, months have passed and the next one is coming down the pipeline.

“It means I cherish the early morning hours before I go in. It's during these times that I feel a deep sense of peace and quiet and so my mind can wander, free of project goalposts and timelines.”

Free of these pressures, his “Twenty Three and Twenty Six EP” is testament to operating in a haze of AM detachment. Four drifting scores of ambient invention, tape echo and swimming delay, they’re musical explorations that are beautifully, subtly metrical. Awash with hypnotic rhythms and an unpolished human touch, each track feels like it plays out to its untraced, natural end. 
  
“I love these happy accidents as I feel they are a natural part of the improvisation process” he explains. “I enjoy these opportunities to practice improvisation and I’ve discovered that these free-spirited explorations often end up feeling finely choreographed in the end. Perhaps this is some sort of primal response or urge to seek rhythm in my life?” he ponders.

Whatever the thought process, the still hours just got more beautiful.

More info and HQ EP download: http://asip.me/ASIP023

http://asip.me/PlacesSeries


ASIP023 Benjamin Dauer - Eight and Forty

Free Download

Je t'aime

Sometimes, an album comes along which blows everything else out of the water. Then, you learn it’s the artist’s very first release in this particular style. And then, that little tingly feeling you get from discovering a new favourite artist creeps up your back at you sit clasping your headphones with eyes wide open, in anticipation for the next track, for more, and more.

This sounds pretty dramatic, but this is exactly how I felt when I first heard Roger Martinez’s self-titled production as Horizontal Excursions. The electronic DJ/Producer from the Netherlands had well and truly grabbed my attention under his new moniker and his album, was easily one of the best releases of 2011.

Two years later, Roger has revisited his Horizontal Excursions ambient guise, taken a trip into nature’s beating heart and pulled off another absolutely beautiful piece of work that ambient enthusiasts like me, simply fall for again and again.

-

The wilderness stirs something primal and unfathomable in us all. We become overwhelmed, awestruck, even emboldened, by these untamed frontiers, content to revel in the unspoiled beauty or compelled to explore what lies within. For some, it’s a cold, harsh reality; an unforgiving tundra of survival and subsistence. But, when afforded the indulgence, this isolation is the purest of them all.

“There aren’t many places left in Western Europe where you can still immerse yourself in pure wilderness” Roger begins, “in fact, the only environment where I have truly experienced this is in certain parts of Switzerland. My latest trip to Zermatt, located in the canton of Valais, has greatly shaped the music in this symphony and I was reminded that all of nature is something that should be respected and revered.”

A regular traveller through the country, Roger’s willingness to lose himself (in every sense of the word) in the abundance of natural beauty heralded Symphonica Helvetica – an untainted journey through the mysticism of the Alps, velveteen swoop of Swiss valleys, and the siren-song of nature.

“Away from the large cities of Zürich and Basel, you enter into a totally different kind of environment,” he states. “For me mountainous areas epitomize something indescribable, something sacred. I lose sense of identity and, sometimes literally, become lost in the landscape around me.

Inspired by the power of his surroundings, Symphonica Helvetica crystallizes those moments, and Roger captures, and softens, the endeavour of trekking through the terrain. A symphonic soundtrack that casts a heavy ambient blanket, there’s a sense of uphill resistance as the summit nears; the enormity of casting an infinite gaze for miles; the deep, contented inhale as you survey the forest canopy thousands of feet below and feel, for that moment, like it’s all you.

“In these places you really see nature at work: sculpting, flowing and grinding through the mountains,” Roger explains. “The fruits of my past trips through the mountains of Switzerland have amalgamated into the symphony that I present to you here. This is the musical translation of the visions and experiences I had standing on the edge of mountain cliffs, overlooking valleys, walking through snow-clad forests, enchanted by mountain tops in full view. These are the shamanic songs of Mother Nature still at reign in her grand domain: a living myth put into sound pressure waves.”

http://asip.me/ASIP024

ASIP024 Horizontal Excursions - Symphonica Helvetica

Asa & Sorrow - Nightshade [OUT NOW]

http://bit.ly/volorflexsabo ::

A master of lovelorn emotional surrender, Volor Flex brings his narrative to an end with Sabo, his fourth and last album under this alias. The reasons are only his to know, but Volor Flex certainly won't be this producer's final musical persona. Parts of Sabo already hint at subtle changes in direction and style - natural consequences of artistically perfecting oneself - showcasing even more of Volor's expert manipulation of samples and composer skills. 

Volor Flex's reputation and popularity have been steadily on the rise for the past two years; he has released 3 albums and 3 EPs, all representative of what it means to brilliantly adapt the specifics of a signature style while living up to the staple sound itself. The man who has been referred to as Burial 2.0, Alex Frolov of Syktyvkar, Komi Republic, Russia delivers us a complete, 20-track long, intensely introspective album, possibly his finest work to date. 

Sabo is laden with familiar bittersweet moods made of crisp, dancy garage breaks paired with artfully constructed soundscapes as fragile as glass that Volor peels back until they break apart and fade away. All twenty tracks enclose the darnkess of the boreal forest, the harshness of the tundra, the anxiousness of isolation, the solace of being lost in thought and the memories of a loved one. Volor Flex adds a new expanse to the timeless comfort area that he's been building and has now completed, a place of relief and daydreaming the listener will repeatedly want to come back to.

Volor Flex - Vişnu

We’re so busy navigating concrete jungles and determinedly juggling schedules with mindless routine, it’s a welcome rarity for many of us to experience true postcard perfection. But walking in the shadows of New Zealand’s Southern Alps, Micah Templeton-Wolfe found that the snow-capped surroundings stirred something as he travelled through the south of the country.

“’Frozen Skies’ captures the feeling of the first time I travelled throughout the South Island of New Zealand in 2005,” he explains, “I was truly amazed by the raw beauty of the landscapes, from the stillness of the vast lakes to the majestic heights of the Southern Alps. Every time I’ve visited this place, there is an overwhelming feeling of solitude, of being totally immersed in the vast and striking textures of this beautiful place."

A track that hums into life from atmospheric beginnings, it feels like Karin Dreijer Andersson’s warped yelp is lurking, ready to wickedly cut through the drone. Instead, ‘Frozen Skies’ evolves into a track of yearning discovery, its moody, glacial pace mirroring the cold beauty of the landscape that inspired it.

Awash with fleeting builds and yearning strings, it feels like a mournful journey of a dying day; the sun sinking into the glacial lakes in the distance, a soundtrack to just staring ahead and seeing life, not death, in a ruggedly endless horizon.

http://asip.me/ASIP025

ASIP025 Stray Theories - Frozen Skies

EP on bandcamp: http://bit.ly/15k6edD
Glitchy.Tonic.Records : http://www.glitchytonicrecords.com/

EP - Across the Sky  [Out on Glitchy.tonic.records]

Standing tall on Kompakt’s Pop Ambient compilation back in 2003, Leandro’s lush ambient sound set the precedent and style for what is now a remarkable ongoing series for the German label. It was tracks like Leandro Fresco’s, ‘Buenos Amigos‘ that really took my love for ambient music up a notch, and also opened my eyes to this new style of deep, heavily textured electronic ambient music. It’s an understatement to say how proud I am to have such a remarkable producer contribute to the Places Series.

Fast-forward ten years, and last week Leandro gave us a gentle reminder of his beautiful, warm ambient style, with this mix for Sgustok Magazine. And as if timing couldnt be any better, we’re now treated to Leandro’s latest masterpiece for The Places Series.

Patagonia’s always held a personal fascination. With a small, Welsh-speaking population over 7,000 miles away from Wales, it’s an odd displacement, but for the 5,000 that speak Patagonian Welsh, it’s undoubtedly home.

It’s a theme that poignantly plays out for Leandro Fresco – the lure of his parents’ house providing the happy, creative escape from the frenzy of Buenos Aires. “I wrote this song in a beautiful small city in Argentinian Patagonia where my parents live,” he explains. “This has been my favourite place to write for a long time, a place where I can escape from Buenos Aires.”

And it was this transition from the hustle of the Argentine capital to the serenity of Patagonia’s San Martin De Los Andes that helped provide the snowy inspiration for ‘Almas Sin Prisa’ (‘Souls without Haste’).

“I remember sitting in my room facing the window, watching the snowflakes fall and improvising on the keyboard,” Leandro reminisces. “Looking through the glass, I saw two people walking away in the storm, holding hands. These were the first minutes of the night when the sun was just beginning to hide and I kept on thinking about who these strangers were.”

This sense of the unanswered lends ‘Almas Sin Prisa’ a baleful, blissful feel. Beautifully layered, you can almost feel the weight of the snowfall cloud your line of vision, those first delicate snowflakes amassing to become tumbling white walls; the delicate movement and feather-light melodies conveying a distance as they gracefully drift away; the subtle drone lending a dreamy finale as the snowy silhouettes fade out to white.

“I’ll never know,” he smiles, “but while the music played, and I drank my cup of tea, I was happy to be in the warmth of my home and glad that I saw this simple show. Just two people in the storm. Just two souls without haste.”

For HQ download please visit http://asip.me/ASIP026

ASIP026 Leandro Fresco - Almas Sin Prisa

Music from A Strangely Isolated Place + 9128.live.

Ambient & electronica music blog, mix series, record label and radio station. Est. 2008.