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from 'Nomad Frequencies' [CD|2xLP|DIGITAL]
Denovali Records · den237
available in September on all formats at [http://denovali.com/johnlemke]

An ardent moulder of sound, John Lemke began carving out a very unique music blend on his debut album 'People Do' (2013) and its follow up EP 'Walizka' (2014). Informed by his work as a sound designer & composer for documentary films and his natural inclination towards fusing rhythm with rich textures and emotive melodies, he set out on a musical path that had been long in the making and is ever evolving.

The quest for unusual, inspiring sound sources has always been at the heart of John's process, however the genesis of his second album 'Nomad Frequencies' was rooted in much more inadvertent circumstances. In the summer of 2014, forced to indefinitely evacuate his Glasgow flat and studio due to structural damage from one hour to the next, with nothing more than a laptop and a bag of clothes, John embarked on a six month odyssey of soul searching, couch surfing and spending an extended period of time in his old hometown of Berlin for the first time in years - it was to be an odyssey that would help ferment and distill the ideas of his second album on which work had just begun. 

A year of particular global turmoil and upheaval, combined with John's personal, albeit very minor, 'displacement', caused a lot of questioning, frustration and anger, which somehow found its way onto the new material: a more confrontational, at times aggressive sound, paired on the other hand with a yearning for harmony, balance and space. Other influences came less from the world of music, but rather in visual form, through the densely textural art of Anselm Kiefer and the political, yet poetic musings of film maker Adam Curtis.

Intent on refining his sound toward a more minimal, bolder style, John set out to limit his sonic palate to a handful of carefully chosen elements. At the centre of this new direction remains the muted piano already introduced on his debut, but in a much more purified and raw form. This organic base is adorned by the warm fuzzing and wavering of analogue synthesisers, tape echoes, meditative tuning forks, field recordings from John's 'exile' period and percussion based on his rigid approach to sampling, which started developing on 'Walizka'. The guiding principle of his orthodox style of recording and sampling is to only use home-made sounds by utilising his own field recordings, applying contact microphones or hydrophones to objects and instruments, running them through different kinds of speakers and re-recording the sounds to arrive at a 'lived in' quality, often misunderstood as plainly 'lo-fi'. Touches of viola and woodwinds parts (Kim Moore of WOLF and Andrew Baker respectively) provide melody fragments and subtle details throughout the journey.

With John's healthy disregard for genre boundaries, the array of influences on 'Nomad Frequencies' is vast, but never over-powering. From the meditative tuning fork that starts proceedings on 'Of Elsewhere', the dub echoes to the hints of minimalism, free jazz explosions to the Lynchian atmospherics, all elements serve nothing more than the album's narrative journey between friction and harmony, best appreciated in its entirety. A rhythmic backbone collides with rich ambience and melody, often infectious and jarring at the same time, forging a soulful whole which most likely only reveals its true self after multiple spins.

Nomad Frequencies

John Lemke - The Unwinding

Debut album out August 21 on Hammock Music. Preorder: bit.ly/1HZ7uJj

Linen Garden Pt. 1 (feat. Hammock)

"Woven Tide" is the debut album by From The Mouth of The Sun, the new collaboration between Dag Rosenqvist, aka Jasper TX, and Aaron Martin.

"Out of the charred embers of dusk 'Woven Tide' emerges with an incandescent glow. Each glimmer cast by the sustained notes of ebony keys, the taut strings of the cello, and the rampant buzz of guitar lights our way, gives us hope, brings us into the dawn of a new day. As From The Mouth of the Sun, the duo act as our torchbearers, scrawling messages along the walls of an elongated cave, toiling through the decayed remnants of fetid matter to create eight illuminating pieces. The listener, who has wiled away the hours, will find a door; 'Woven Tide' will be the light out of the darkness." - Michael Vitrano / Desire Path Recordings

Pieces from "Woven Tide" as well as solo work by Aaron Martin accompanies the new documentary film by Lost Hill Picture's Ross McDonnell and Carter Gunn for Fastnet Films, Remember Me, My Ghost, which is currently touring the film festival circuit.?McDonnell and Carter are most recently known for their award winning documentary film Colony which documents the unexplainable phenomenon known as Colony Collapse Disorder that has left landscapes of empty beehives all across America, and also features music by Aaron Martin.? An upcoming short film by McDonnell and Carter featuring Color Loss from Woven Tide will be included on an upcoming Wholpin DVD magazine published by McSweeney's.

Since 2005 Gothenburg, Sweden based musician Dag Rosenqvist's work has graced imprints including Miasmah, Fang Bomb, Under The Spire, Lampse, Lidar, Slaapwel, Kning Disk, Dead Pilot Records, Lowpoint, and Rural Colors.

Since 2006 Topeka, Kansas based composer Aaron Martin's work has found its rightful home on labels such as Preservation, Mobeer, Experimedia, Type, Under The Spire, and Sonic Meditations. Aaron's most recent solo album, Worried About The Fire, is also available from Experimedia.

The Crossing
Pools of Rust
Color Loss
My Skin Drinks Light That Has Passed through Leaves
Sitting in a Roofless Room
Like Shadows in an Empty Cathedral
A Season in Waters
Snow Burial (While Blue Skies Gather)

All music recorded and mixed in Gothenburg, SE and Topeka, KS by Dag Rosenqvist and Aaron Martin June - December 2010.

Cover artwork & layout by Chris Koelle.
Mastered by Taylor Deupree.

http://label.experimedia.net/021/

Like Shadows in an Empty Cathedral

‘Loon’ will be released on Erased Tapes as a 12” vinyl as well as digitally on October 2nd. 
Pre-order it here: www.erasedtapes.com/store/index/ERATP072
or via iTunes: http://snip.ftpromo.net/loon

Containing five synthesiser-led pieces, ‘Loon’ was recorded in autumn 2014 across five days at Nils’s Durton Studio in Berlin, and continues on from the ambient sounds of ‘Stare’ but with the addition of more percussive elements and dub influences. For this new EP the duo wired an Oberheim 4 Voice and a Korg PS3100 to the mixing desk and performed live takes on both instruments. With all four hands on its pots, all mixes were recorded straight onto 2-track ½-inch tape.

Like on ‘Stare’, their first collaborative affair in 2012, they simply followed what was laying in front of them, and this time they were driven by some new synths, a kick drum and tape effects. Indulging in dub, the tracks where all performed rather than engineered, with Ólafur riding a few elements on faders and Nils bringing effects in and out. After running several mixes, they went for the five strongest moments from this session. The release was announced on a joint website www.arnaldsfrahm.com together with the launch of an intimate 45-minute studio film titled ‘Trance Frendz’, featuring another seven improvisations.

“Nils got some new synths and we thought we’d try them out. We loved them so much that we didn’t actually end up using anything else to make these songs.” – Ólafur Arnalds

“When I was young I was smuggled to Goa parties by my brother. The music played there in the late nineties had a somewhat deep effect on me. ‘Loon’ is almost a blurry memory of these times. In other words, it is what I’d like to remember that music sounded like back then. In fact it sounded probably really cheesy.” – Nils Frahm

Loon

Four

Buy 12"/DL

Ólafur Arnalds & Nils Frahm – Four

from 'Scandinavia' [CD|2xLP|DIGITAL]
Denovali Records · den245
available on all formats at [http://denovali.com/multicastdynamics]

Samuel van Dijk is an electronic music producer, sound designer and media artist from the Netherlands, having released electronic music under a variety of projects, namely, Mohlao and VC-118A. With his current project Multicast Dynamics he creates ever-evolving sound textures culminating in intriguing soundscapes while preserving a tranquil cinematic atmosphere. Drawing inspiration from nature, technology, film and fiction, his music productions, live sets and audiovisual work presents a carefully arranged, recorded and processed body of work, using a vast amount of layered sound textures, field recordings and live improvisation. In May 2015, Denovali Records released the first two albums of a four part series by Multicast Dynamics, conceptually linked by our undeniable connection with nature and its wide range of landscapes, colors and movement. Now the third album called SCANDINAVIA follows in October 2015??.  The album series moves from an evolutionary to a cosmological scale: Starting from dry land filled with light and streams, to the constantly changing surfaces of the oceans, into a frozen and murky underwater world, finally up to the arrival in an interstellar space and the cosmos. With this concept Multicast Dynamics explores organic and aqueous worlds in a dreamlike and spiritual appearance.

SCANDINAVIA is the third installment in the four part series. Assembled during the coldest season, it’s an album full of contemplative electronic recordings, created by the use of granular synthesis, obscure delay units and rudimentary looping techniques on magnetic tape. Recorded with a longsighted outlook, SCANDINAVIA features washes of subdued tones and textures as well as melancholic and warm sounding pulses of noise - all characterized by distinctive aquatic features. Steadily flowing, but slowly awakening the album draws frozen remote landscapes ranging from dark, cold and desolated to melting, warm and hope.
SCANDINAVIA opens with a bleak arctic environment in deep hibernation, where echoes of glacial bursts cut the silence. An undulating mass of viscous ambience sends out blurred out signals through the storm. In this inhospitable surrounding of frost and ice slow changes appear. The form of the landscapes alters and the cold air no longer hinders the breathing. Slowly meltwater seeps out underneath thick layers of ice, slowly building up in momentum and space. Layers of hypnotic atmospheres with barely perceptible undercurrents, brooding pulses of bass and tonal patterns lead to the core of the sonic landscape. Gently radiant layers of light and soil emerge and aquatic echoes expose new paths. The water is harnessed. Preparations for a long journey have begun.

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