Akari is the third album from Tokyo duo Illuha. Following 2011’s debut Shizuku (12k1067) and 2013’s Interstices (12k2028), Akari takes the next artistic step for the band. While Shizuku was recorded in the US and completed separately by the artists, Interstices captured the duo creating their exceptionally detailed music together live during a Japaneses tour. Akari, in turn, is the first studio album where Illuha recorded and mixed together, throughout the entire process. The beautiful st-robo studio in Tokyo put a collection of amazing equipment at their fingertips, from vintage mics and outboard gear to a vast collection of instruments, both acoustic and electronic. Their writing sessions were numerous and long with details meticulously obsessed over for nearly a year. The result is the most bewildering music Illuha have created to date. An album swimming with the most delicately tactile sounds and instrumentation that draws the listener in with hushed, motionless attention.

While Illuha’s Corey Fuller and Tomoyoshi Date are often drawn to the most sparse notes of Rhodes and Wurlitzer electric pianos, acoustic grand piano and guitar, the breadth of instrumentation is partially what makes Akari so abosrbing. They have succeeded in creating their own universe of sound, so beautifully recorded, where each element not only has its own space but connects and interacts so fluidly with the other sounds. It is as if they are placed perfectly by nature, the compositions are fluid and organic, a far cry from anything calculated or structured. It is this open space that the music exists in which in turn defines the music itself. There is ample room to breathe within this forest of gentle tines, bubbling analogue synthesizers, clicking percussion and quiet field recordings. This is subtlety at its most refined; hushed without being saccharine, distant without being morose.

Akari is the Japanese word for light. Conceputally the duo used this word as a guide, as if they were searching through the dark, trying to keep the light alive, as if one is cradling a candle doing everything in their power to keep it alight in a storm. It is this almost visceral sense of sheltering, of protection, that gives Akari a very human and personal sound whose intensely deep focus is as impressive as it is arresting.

Akari

Structures Based on the Plasticity of Sphere Surface Tension

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Structures Based On The Plasticity Of Sphere Surface Tension

This track 'Sagittarian' was released as part of the 'Die Welt ist Klang' Pete Namlook Tribute package. The full package contains 8 CDs worth of material in a nice wooden box. It is also available as a digital download. 
I'm giving my track away here gratis, you can grab the full release from http://namlooktribute.bandcamp.com/album/die-welt-ist-klang-a-tribute-to-pete-namlook

Material Object - Sagittarian

Andrea Belfi - "Natura Morta" out november 7th on Miasmah.

Natura Morta, "dead nature" or "still life". This album can be understood as a powerful study of the minute details of the art of electro-acoustic composition, as much as the Renaissance "nature morte" were a masterful display of the artist’s skill in portraying the glow of a ripe fruit, or capturing the light beaming on a vacant chair.

Six tracks, to be listened to as two long explorations in the art of variation and repetition. Layers of drums and percussions intertwine with synth waves making the portrait come to life, detail after detail, until a complex figure emerges from the white canvas. The constant, unsteady sounds, wavering noise, swirling cymbals, and distant feedback gently pull the listener into the picture, letting them enjoy every detail of this beautifully staged compositions.

Recorded at EMS studio, Stockholm, ZKM in Karlsruhe and at the legendary Funkhaus in Berlin, this album mixes influences from both Italian minimalism and the electro-acoustic contemporary scene. Somewhere in between the electronics of Keith Fullerton Whitman, the percussive repetitions of Jon Mueller, and the atmospheric sensibility of Pan-American.

Andrea Belfi - Roteano

Visit jsmatteson.com for more.
Video: https://youtu.be/O9dbfLFKBq4

Radii (JSMatteson)

At the Gate

Worth more than the wait

Taken from 'Sensorimotor Remixes' LP by Lusine, out September 15, 2017.

Purchase at The Ghostly Store: https://www.theghostlystore.com/products/sensorimotor-remixes
Or at the retailer of your choice: Ghostly.lnk.to/sensorimotor-remixes

Sensorimotor Remixes

Lusine - Tropopause (Loscil Remix)

Premiering on the Ransom Note: https://bit.ly/2MyJojX

"An enchanting new album." - The Ransom Note 

Heinali is the alias of self-taught composer and sound-designer Oleg Shpudeiko from Ukraine. Now well established under the name he brings along his latest full length ‘Iridescent’ due for release on October 12th on Injazero Records. 

Having garnered rapturous responses to his earlier output and last year’s ‘Anthem’ Oleg continues to push the boundaries and experiment with altering mood and atmospheres of any space - with abstract yet deeply personal transmissions of ambient synthesiser work and subaqueous, minimal techno contortions. 

‘Iridescent’ consists of fragments of studio improvisation sessions recorded in 2016 and 2017, some of them recorded in one unedited take on a modular system and some layered and later morphed into compositions. As the title suggests Heinali crafts shimmering, incandescent portraits, rich in his unique characteristics and compositional liberty. 

Apart from the “musical sculptures,” that represent the bulk of this LP, Oleg was interested in the exploration of polyphonic capabilities of the modular system. ‘Rainbow Folding’, a loose homage to Terry Riley’s 'A Rainbow In Curved Air,' features an interplay of several independent, but distinct voices and their processed shadows — ‘ghost voices’. In 'Shadow Invention’ eerie atmospherics steal the spotlight and dominate the composition, ending in a cacophony of the ‘ghost voices’. 

Oleg says of the album, “it’s a kind of studio dairy. A reflection on the development of my relations with the hardware instruments and exploration of them as channelling vessels for my experiences and ideas.” 

“One can think of Iridescent’ as ‘musical sculpture’ analogy — when the body of music stays the same, but its surface is flickering with various colours over time — sometimes in a subtle manner, sometimes loud and clear. Or it can be understood in the context of various colours of polyphony, or as a liminal condition of the colour as if it’s being ‘stuck’ in the mist of twilight zone between neighbouring colour-states, so it can’t become a particular colour and is in a flickering kaleidoscopic state.” 

‘Iridescent’ bares Oleg’s style of sonic storytelling and austere, otherworldly textural embellishments that bring to mind Ben Frost, Akira Yamaoka, and Oneohtrix Point Never but also plants the seed for much more club ready electro. ‘Starling Reprise I’ is a scorching piece of ambient techno that conjures Four Tet, LTO and Susumu Yokota’s blissful, kaleidoscopic synth work whilst ‘Starling Reprise II’ retains the frosty, steely ambience that has become Heinali’s calling card. 

Cover artwork by Olga Gaidash.
Mastered by Taylor Deupree at 12k Mastering.

Pre-order

Heinali - Rainbow Folding

From "We Can Sleep Now", available on cassette and digital from Unifactor:
https://unifactor.bandcamp.com/album/we-can-sleep-now

The Mountain (cassette out now on Unifactor)

Adriaan de Roover, who is also known as Oaktree (check out a few of his excellent mixes for Headphone Commute), announces a new EP, titled Voor anderen, with which he joins a Belgian imprint, Dauw. The label has been on the forefront of delicate ambient music, working with graphic artist Femke Strijbol "to create a unique hand-made piece of art that flatters both the ear and the eye." With this new release, they welcome Maarten De Naeyer as a new in-house graphic designer to continue the visual identity while opening up the door to new artists. I continue to be happy with their choice of album covers, which "engage interactions between different art disciplines." The work of Adriaan nicely slots among the label's catalogue, with its soft blurry hues of minimalism, micro-drone and environmental sound. On the EP, elegantly combined organic textures blend with their electronic parallels, sweeping the wide-ranging frequency spectrum across glitters and bass. The selection features commissioned pieces between 2015-2018 "merging feelings of distance and proximity into melancholic sonic entities."

Voor anderen

TRACK PREMIERE : Adriaan de Roover - Voor Damiaan

From the album Seeing Through Sound (Pentimento Volume Two), released on Ndeya 24 July 2020 https://ndeya.ffm.to/seeingthroughsound

jonhassell.com/
jonhassell.bandcamp.com/
www.facebook.com/OfficialJonHassell/
twitter.com/ndeyarecords
www.instagram.com/ndeya_records/

Seeing Through Sound (Pentimento Volume Two) MP3

Jon Hassell | Unknown Wish

Modular techno-adjacent ambient.

Label curator at @muzaneditions
Organizer at @feelthemoment2021
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The Mountain (cassette out now on Unifactor)

Endurance