Lars-Gunnar Bodin - from Semikolon side A (Paradigm Discs PD 29)

Bodin/Johnson - Vietnam from Semikolon (Paradigm Discs PD 29)

Adam Bohman - Waterfall Song (from Music And Words 2)

Spoken word recording taken from a trip to Wiesbaden, 1999

Adam Bohman - Wiesbaden pt 6 (from Music Ands Words 2)

Taken from side 1 of the LP Anthropological Constants, released by Paradigm Discs in 2017

Anthropological Constants

Dentists For Mice

Kymatik - Dentists For Mice

recording of a phone conversation from the LP The Seddon Tapes volume 1

The Seddon Tapes Volume 1

May I explain my situation

Captain Maurice Seddon - May I explain my situation

From the LP Mirror by Amnon Raviv (Paradigm Discs PD 34). All the tracks are untitled. This is the first of 2 tracks on side 2

Amnon Raviv - 5

This 2CD is essentially a retrospective of Eastley’s installation work. As such, it updates and adds many new examples to the 1975 release “New and Rediscovered Musical Instruments”, which was released as a split LP with David Toop on Brian Eno’s Obscure Records.
This is Eastley’s first solo CD. Of the 35 tracks, only the last 2 have any guests or ‘playing’ (the most virtuosic moment being George Lewis playing a grass blade). All the other pieces are either powered by the natural forces of wind and water, or else are motor driven gallery installations. 
The ethereal sounds of the aeolian harp, the haunting aeolian flutes, and the violent tension of his aerophone installations are hallmark Eastley sounds. These sounds, and many others, sit amidst a wide range of acoustic settings, from windy hill tops to quiet brooks, residential street scenes to coastal shores. The indoor recordings are no less varied, ranging across a rich variety of acoustics and gallery spaces from tiny micro sounds to large scale amplification. Wood, metal and stone are brought to life with electricity. Although there are many photos in the 20 page booklet, much is left to the imagination to work out how the sounds are made. With this limited access to the visual, the focus is pulled towards the musicality of the sounds themselves. This musicality is reinforced by the slow crossfades of most of the pieces from indoors to outdoors to form a series of suites. 
The recordings mostly date from the mid 70s, but there are pieces from later decades. Nearly everything was recorded either to Revox or Uher and occasionally cassette, using what microphones were available at the time. Recent recordings are digital. The varying quality of the recording set-ups across this 2CD adds yet another dimension to the shifting sound fabric of this anthology. 

Max Eastley - Installation No.3 Pt. 2 (Ikon Gallery, Birmingham)

This track starts with impromptu harmonies from the children of St. Paul's Cathedral School choir, who were passing through the gallery.

This 2CD is essentially a retrospective of Eastley’s installation work. As such, it updates and adds many new examples to the 1975 release “New and Rediscovered Musical Instruments”, which was released as a split LP with David Toop on Brian Eno’s Obscure Records.
This is Eastley’s first solo CD. Of the 35 tracks, only the last 2 have any guests or ‘playing’ (the most virtuosic moment being George Lewis playing a grass blade). All the other pieces are either powered by the natural forces of wind and water, or else are motor driven gallery installations. 
The ethereal sounds of the aeolian harp, the haunting aeolian flutes, and the violent tension of his aerophone installations are hallmark Eastley sounds. These sounds, and many others, sit amidst a wide range of acoustic settings, from windy hill tops to quiet brooks, residential street scenes to coastal shores. The indoor recordings are no less varied, ranging across a rich variety of acoustics and gallery spaces from tiny micro sounds to large scale amplification. Wood, metal and stone are brought to life with electricity. Although there are many photos in the 20 page booklet, much is left to the imagination to work out how the sounds are made. With this limited access to the visual, the focus is pulled towards the musicality of the sounds themselves. This musicality is reinforced by the slow crossfades of most of the pieces from indoors to outdoors to form a series of suites. 
The recordings mostly date from the mid 70s, but there are pieces from later decades. Nearly everything was recorded either to Revox or Uher and occasionally cassette, using what microphones were available at the time. Recent recordings are digital. The varying quality of the recording set-ups across this 2CD adds yet another dimension to the shifting sound fabric of this anthology. 

Max Eastley - Serpentine Gallery (1976), from Installation Recordings (Paradigm Discs, PD 26)

Daphne Oram is best known for her design of her Oramics system, and also for co-founding the BBC Radiophonic Workshop in 1958. At the time of writing, the only easily available piece of music by her on CD has been the 8 minute long ‘Four Aspects’. There was also a 7” EP from 1962 on HMV, released as part of the ‘Listen, Move and Dance’ series that was specifically designed to help children dance. Although the short pieces on this record are very basic it could be argued that this was the first ever electronic dance record! 
Now for the first time is a survey of nearly all the major pieces that she produced since her departure from the BBC in January 1959 until her final tape piece in 1977. During this time she worked independently in her home studio, and thanks to a grant from the Gulbenkian Foundation in 1962 she was able to persue her interest in developing her own electronic music. In Britain there were no state funded studios other than the Radiophonic Workshop which in its earliest times mainly existed at the behest of the drama studio and was not generally seen as a place to develop personal artistic ideas. There were also no university studios at this time, so it was necessary for British electronic composers to be self funded. Throughout this period she devoted her attention to developing her Oramics ‘drawn sound’ system, which consisted of a large machine that enabled patterns drawn on transparent 35mm film to be converted into sound. This system was eventually fully realised in the late 60’s and several pieces here incorporate its use.
The 2 and a half hours of music on this 2CD set covers the whole range of Oram’s post BBC output. All of the music is electronic with some occassional use of instruments, especially small percussion and piano frame. There is also some use of musique concrète techniques. The works fall roughly into the following catagories: works for TV and cinema advertising, film soundtracks, music for theatre productions, installations and exhibitions as well as concert pieces and several studio experiments. Also included are 4 mini compositions that resulted from an experimental music course given by Oram at a high school in Yorkshire in 1967.

Daphne Oram - Pulse Persephone (1965) from the 2CD Oramics, (Paradigm Discs, PD 21)

Track 22 from CD2

The first CD in this set is a reissue of an obscure cassette release from 1983 that was originally released in a small edition on the London based, It’s War Boys label. This C60 consisted of 2 distinct halves. Side 1 was formed around several mixes of an experimental track, constructed from a room-sized 24 track loop. A version of this track first appeared on the LP Flagellation by The Just Measurers (who were C. D. Greyt, Yakkö Banovic and Narki Brillans).

Side 2 is a collage of mostly unused (and some remixed), excerpts from what became the title track of the Milk From Cheltenham LP, Triptych of Poisoners. This LP track consisted of a tape collage of the live mixdown of 17 cassette recordings of locked record grooves, simultaneously, with stray radio and an infernal matchbox. The full Milk LP is now available on CD via Alga Marghen. Both these LPs were also originally It’s War Boys projects. 

As with other releases by these guys nobody worked under the same name twice, but if you are familiar with their soundworld then there will be no mystery. Nearly all the session material here was engineered by Chris Grey, best known for his work with The Homosexuals.

No production master was ever found for CD1, so one of the actual cassette edition had to be used in its place. However, whilst looking through the archive for the master tape, an alternative version of the tape was found, which although it followed a similar blueprint to CD1 it also contained some very different music, some primitive disco drum programming, and a somewhat more sophisticated sound quality. It was difficult to choose which version to release, so both versions appear here, the second disc thrown in for free.

Each CD also contains an additional much longer bonus track at the end that was originally intended as working material for the unfinished second Milk From Cheltenham LP.

The guest musicians on this CD set are many and varied, but it’s all put together by Gus Coma, Lepke B’s dwarfish cousin, who renounced show-biz to work as a Heavy Goods Vehicle driver. All in, the material here is the strangest and most experimental music to come from the It’s War Boys scene. Expect gigantic tape loop symphonies, sundry plunderphonics, lo- fi Sparks and the voice of JFK, a William Burroughs interview (on one track), and a worn out teach yourself English tape. Color Him Coma !

Gus Coma - Smart Guy (from the 2CD, Color Him Coma), Paradigm Discs (PD 27)

This is the first track from the album, it's really the title track I suppose

Beyond the Black Crack was the concept of Reverend Dwight Frizzell, a musician, film maker, Doctor of Metaphysics and minister in the Universal Church of Life. It remains a little known classic, and one of the most unique listening experiences in modern experimental music. Recorded between 1974 and 1976 in locations as diverse as factories, the pyramid opposite Harry Truman's grave site as well as more 'conventional' concert settings. Beyond the Black Crack is a dark, dizzying and exhilarating journey through free jazz, electronics and environmental sound, all shattered by Frizzell's radical tape editing. This CD re-release adds further material to the original LP: - "The Wandering Madness of Basilea", a suite from 1977 unheard until now, as well as unreleased material from the Black Crack sessions. 

Beyond the black crack was originally released in mono in an edition of 200 copies by Cavern Custom in 1976 (cat. no. 6104-12), to commemorate the First Annual End of the World Celebration, November 18 1976. 

Anal Magic & Rev. Dwight Frizzell - Black Crack And The Sole Survivors (from Beyond The Black Crack)

First track from the CD

Over the last 25 years Cusack and Eastley have been gradually adding episodes to the collection of compositions that make up this CD. The foundation of this work consists of location recordings layered with the live or recycled sounds of Eastley's kinetic sculpture. Over the same period that this CD evolved Cusack helped with setting up the LMC, worked for 2 years at Studio Steim in Holland, co-founded Bead Records and released several LP's on this label. His long term musical collaborators have included: Clive Bell, Nic Collins and Viv Corringham, as well as the group Alterations (with Steve Beresford, Terry Day and David Toop). Recent CD's are available on Platelunch, ReR and Resonance. He also frequently works with artists in other fields, including most recently in September 2000, "The Week of Small Miracles", a large scale outdoor project in the Lea Valley area of East London which he curated. Meanwhile Eastley's last 25 years have been spent more in the art gallery than the concert hall, with exhibitions in the UK at The Serpentine Gallery (1976) and The Arnolfini (1980). Overseas installations include The Apollohuis in Holland (1984), the Museum Of Modern Art, Nagoya, Japan and Xebec Hall, Kobe, Japan (both 1994). His most recent exhibits were seen this year as part of Sonic Boom at the Hayward Art Gallery in London. He has also been involved in musical performance, especially the Whirled Music project in the 80s and also ongoing collaborations with David Toop and occasional work with Thomas Köner. He has recorded for many labels including Incus, Quartz and most memorably his 2 releases with David Toop (New and Rediscovered Instruments, originally on Obscure, 1975, and Buried Dreams, on Beyond, 1994). Eastley's work is concerned with creating delicate and elegant kinetic sound devices, either motor driven or animated by environmental forces like the wind, streams or the sea.

Peter Cusack & Max Eastley - Peep Show (from Day For Night), Paradigm Discs (PD 14)

Originally released in 1973. This is from the first of 2 LPs by GAEB

Although the Gravity Adjusters Expansion Band (GAEB) started in 1967 they remain one of the long lost and underestimated groups that explored the areas of sound sculpture, improvisation, experimental music and free jazz. The group have their roots in playing in and around the San Francisco Bay Area, and finally recorded their first LP in Los Angeles. Free jazz drummer Lee Charlton seemlessly shifs the moods from jazzy phrasing into the far more abstracted ideas of the world of sound sculpure. It is this abstract world where the GAEB mostly reside, using the invented instruments of multi-media artist Richard Waters, many of whose percussive and bowed instruments incorporate water filled resonators to bend and tune the sound. Although many other improvisors at the time like AMM, MEV, Sonde and Taj Mahal Travellers all made extensive use of home made and adapted instruments, the GAEB are a very different concern with their own unmistakeable identity. Their first LP “One” appeared in 1973 on Nocturne Records, a small Californian label. It was the first of their 2 LPs, the second appearing some 8 years later. This CD edition is a reissue of the first LP from the master tapes and also contains some 15 minutes of extra material from the time.

Gravity Adjusters Expansion Band - Amerizenitation (from the CD One), Paradigm Discs (PD 20)

1980 was an incredibe year for London’s experimental music scene with many different strands. Recommended Records were rereleasing the first two Faust LP’s, L. Voag had found ‘the way out’, Swell Maps were ‘in occupied Europe’. Throbbing Gristle and other industrialists were giving plenty of live actions. Nurse With Wound had just released their first LP, as had This Heat. The other great LP on Piano Records by Steve Beresford was also on the shelves. Meanwhile, elsewhere in the capitol Adam Bohman was making his first recordings working with two budget cassette recorders. Bunhill Row was the first complete album of material, but whilst the aforementioned artists were pressing up their recordings and making them easily available via Rough Trade or the Recommended Records ‘shop’, Adam’s releases remained in tiny cassette editions made for friends or exchanged on the mail art network.
So here for the first time is Bunhill Row, released as it should have appeared at the time - on vinyl.
It must be said that this is quite unlike any of Adam’s other releases, and quite unlike his work with Morphogenesis, or his work as one half of The Bohman Brothers. This is ‘songs’ - 30 in all, and the main instrument used is a trumpet (an ordinary trumpet), along with other acoustic instruments and a vast variety of objects and junk, much of which is still part of the Bohman armoury. The overall feel sits somewhere between R. Steevie Moore and Caroliner, but this is British of course. Somehow it all works, and all in all, opens another window on to the incredibly fruitful astral alignment that occured over London at this time.

Adam also has a solo CD on Paradigm Discs, and also appears on 'Variations - a London compilation' the first CD released on Paradigm Discs. The only other solo CD by Adam is on Mycophile


Adam Bohman - The Milk Chocolate Soldier (from Bunhill Row), Paradigm Discs (PD 19)

Adam Bohman - Talkin' 'bout Manilow (from Bunhill Row), Paradigm Discs (PD 19)

Britain’s best known sound poet is Bob Cobbing, but it’s hard to come up with a list of other sound poets working in Britain in the 60’s and 70’s. It’s equally difficult to think of any female sound poets working anywhere. Lily Greenham was Danish, but spent her childhood in Vienna. After several relocations across Europe she settled in London in 1972 with her British husband (musician and poet Peter Greenham), where she lived until her death in 2001. Nearly all of her own writings and compositions date from after her arrival in London, but prior to her arrival in London she had been involved in two major European art movements. In the late 50’s she had been an active member of the early Wienner Gruppe, performing in their wild experimental theatre works and reciting the new poetry of young artists like Gerhard Rühm, Konrad Bayer and A.C. Hartmann, but before the Wienner Gruppe had established itself as the important art movement it was to become, she had moved on and changed her working practice.
In 1964 she was back in Paris for a second time, but this time she was working as a visual artist specialising in optical art. She was soon directly involved in group shows with the ‘Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel’. For the second time she was at the centre of an emerging art movement that was exploring new ground, but predictably enough she moved on. Once in London she began to record her own text based compositions that used a mixture of sound poetry techniques, electronics and multi-tracking. The term ‘lingual music’ that she coined for her compositions refers to her technique of using tape loops of text to create complex and dense musical structures. Her most well known composition in this style is ‘Relativity’, which was made in 1974 in collaboration with the Radiophonic Workshop at the BBC. She also worked with quite a few musicians, both via the early LMC network in London, but also on an international scene. A list of musicians she worked with includes John Tchicai, Wolfgang Dauner, Bob Downes, Barry This piece is a soundtrack to a 16mm film by Irm and Ed Sommer and dates from 1972. The film switches between a series of portraits of artists and the camera rapidly zooms in and out of the portrait. The soundtrack names the artist then repeats the name, pronouncing only the vowels contained in the name. 

Guy, Hugh Davies, Max Eastley and Peter Cusack. This 2CD set compiles a wide variety of her own work, including live solo performaces, film soundtrack pieces, as well as many tape pieces. There are also examples of her performing works by Cobbing, Rühm and other sound poets, as well as recordings of her work with Bob Downes Open Music. The recordings date from between 1968 and 1984.


Lily Greenham - Gesichter/Visages (from Lingual Music), Paradigm Discs (PD 22)

Britain’s best known sound poet is Bob Cobbing, but it’s hard to come up with a list of other sound poets working in Britain in the 60’s and 70’s. It’s equally difficult to think of any female sound poets working anywhere. Lily Greenham was Danish, but spent her childhood in Vienna. After several relocations across Europe she settled in London in 1972 with her British husband (musician and poet Peter Greenham), where she lived until her death in 2001. Nearly all of her own writings and compositions date from after her arrival in London, but prior to her arrival in London she had been involved in two major European art movements. In the late 50’s she had been an active member of the early Wienner Gruppe, performing in their wild experimental theatre works and reciting the new poetry of young artists like Gerhard Rühm, Konrad Bayer and A.C. Hartmann, but before the Wienner Gruppe had established itself as the important art movement it was to become, she had moved on and changed her working practice.
In 1964 she was back in Paris for a second time, but this time she was working as a visual artist specialising in optical art. She was soon directly involved in group shows with the ‘Groupe de Recherche d’Art Visuel’. For the second time she was at the centre of an emerging art movement that was exploring new ground, but predictably enough she moved on. Once in London she began to record her own text based compositions that used a mixture of sound poetry techniques, electronics and multi-tracking. The term ‘lingual music’ that she coined for her compositions refers to her technique of using tape loops of text to create complex and dense musical structures. Her most well known composition in this style is ‘Relativity’, which was made in 1974 in collaboration with the Radiophonic Workshop at the BBC. She also worked with quite a few musicians, both via the early LMC network in London, but also on an international scene. A list of musicians she worked with includes John Tchicai, Wolfgang Dauner, Bob Downes, Barry Guy, Hugh Davies, Max Eastley and Peter Cusack. This 2CD set compiles a wide variety of her own work, including live solo performaces, film soundtrack pieces, as well as many tape pieces. There are also examples of her performing works by Cobbing, Rühm and other sound poets, as well as recordings of her work with Bob Downes Open Music. The recordings date from between 1968 and 1984.


Lily Greenham - Polaris Supermix (from Lingual Music), Paradigm Discs (PD 22)

Paradigm Discs started in 1995 and is a label for experimental and avant garde music, specialising in reissues and archival music, as well as releasing the occassional new music. Artists include Daphne Oram, Pauline Oliveros, Trevor Wishart, Max Eastley and Morphogenesis.

Popular tracks by Paradigm Discs