Drone Home

from the Important Records release, Forse 1. Available on limited edition vinyl at www.importantrecords.com

Nebbia

Foreign Bed - Out on Reverb Worship and direct from Fractal Skulls.
100 Only cassette..

Support - Buy this EP, help fund future releases and a tour.

thefractalskulls@googlemail.com - contact - thefractalskulls@googlemail.com

Foriegn Bed

Patterns- Out on Reverb Worship and direct from Fractal Skulls.
100 Only cassette..

Support - Buy this EP, help fund future releases and a tour.

thefractalskulls@googlemail.com - contact - thefractalskulls@googlemail.com

Patterns

In 1977 Scarfolk Clinic conducted sleep experiments on a local boy known only as 'Patient # 249'. He suffered from severe nightmares and developed a rare condition known as 'manifest hypnagogia'.

Symptoms include the physical manifestation of hallucinations that sufferers endure between sleep and waking states. For example, Patient # 249 frequently awoke to find, sitting on the end of his bed, a syphilitic, deformed Victorian clown eating trifle and pig's liver pâté. At other times, a confused sewing machine salesman from the Midlands would appear. His parents found this inconvenient.

Doctors observed Patient # 249 at home and wired his brain to an EEG, which they attached to a Bontempi electric keyboard. They wanted to record what Patient # 249's brain was doing and translate it into music. In the recording you'll hear the TV in the background before Patient # 249's unconscious brain takes over and he slips into a hypnagogic state.

Patient #249  01.11.1977

The cassette called "Audio Control for Baby" (Scarfolk tapes & records, 1970) has long been lost but we do have this recording of the music playing in the background at the Scarfolk Inconvenient Infant Playcenta. It was piped into every room around the clock at high volume and many child carers found it to be very effective: Enjoying drinks at the pub two doors down from the 'centa', the carers rarely heard any of the babies cry.

Many struggled with the pressures of the job. As one carer, Jocelyn Hurtt, noted at the time, "the kids really set your nerves on edge, especially if, like me, you don't have an affinity with children. You can be right in the middle of a good programme on the telly and one of them will start up: complaining about nightmares, appendicitis or wanting to be freed from their restraints. I really don't know what I'd do without my Martini & lemonades. You're not supposed to hit the little blighters, but if you've had a few drinks you're less tolerant and you don't know your own strength; it only stands to reason and is to be expected. After all, we're only human."

We hope that the extraneous sounds on the recording do not distract too much from the music.


"Audio Control for Baby" (Scarfolk tapes & records, 1970)

Side two of the self-titled, limited edition cassette released by VAALD in 2013

Terminals s/t (side 2)

Terminals s/t (side 1)

The final track from Low Fantasy EP, a forthcoming release by The Resource Centre on Geography Trip.

Slow Release Energy by The Resource Centre

http://scarfolk.blogspot.com/2014/05/clay-stool-tv-theme-tune-klofracs.html

Watch the video here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hMjcn8_F3SA

The theme tune from "Clay Stool," a popular 1970s children's daytime TV programme for 4 to 7 year olds, was released as a single in 1973 under the title "Demons Come In All Shapes & Sizes."

"Clay Stool" acquired its name from a form of medieval punishment for witchcraft. Originally, alleged witches were strapped to a wooden chair - a ducking stool - then plunged into a river. If they sank they were innocent, if they floated they were in league with the devil and summarily executed.

Samuel Revile, a local priest and freelance misogynist, wondered if ducking stools, which were traditionally festooned with dozens of inflated pigs' bladders, colourful helium balloons, and tethered albatrosses had something to do with the high numbers of people being found guilty.

Revile set about inventing the heavier "clay stool." A year after its introduction 100% of accused witches, mostly women, had plummeted to the riverbed where they drowned, proving their innocence.

Revile's work also alerted communities to the dangers of balloons. It was they, he maintained, not the women, that floated and were therefore in league with Satan. To this day, people who make balloon animals are considered unholy and are barred from church jumble sales.

Though Revile revolutionalised the justice system by inventing compassionate torture, he inadvertently caused widespread redundancies in the execution sector.



Demons Come In All Shapes & Sizes (Klofracs Records, 1973)

Korg PS-3100 synthesizer

Recorded live at Lucky's Comics as part of Music Waste
Vancouver, BC
7 June 2014


Sarah Davachi live / Korg PS-3100 / 7 June 2014 / Lucky's Comics (Music Waste, Vancouver)

Jon Brooks - Pond i

Out on the Reverb Worship label.
Recorded in Oxford during Summer 2009. Processed and Mixed sometime during Winter 2009.

http://thefractalskulls.bandcamp.com/album/fractal-skulls

DOWNLOAD THE ALBUM FOR £1/Ltd CD-R FOR £5  (LAST COPIES LEFT!)

Boa Melody Bar Review:

Fractal Skulls - s/t cdr (Reverb Worship) 6 
My first impression of this was to be reminded of Timothy Leary's Turn On, Tune in, Drop Out album. The soothing drone of a tamboura or sitar sets the scene for a set of three pieces and the titles Morning Sun Prayer, Lucifers Chant and The Wicker Sacrifice provide, I suspect, a pretty good notion of what's going on here. It's sold out at source and I'm not at all surprised to hear that.

















Sun Prayer

A recording of the live performance given at The Outer Church, Brighton on 17th February 2012.

Live At The Outer Church February 2012

ÓLAFUR ARNALDS & NILS FRAHM - 'a2' from their forthcoming collaborative EP 'STARE'.

ORDER the Ltd. Edition 10" Vinyl/Download HERE and receive an Erased Tapes 5th Anniversary sticker with it:
http://www.erasedtapes.com/store/index/ERATP042

'A hazy slow-builder that sits nicely equidistant between Arnalds’ solo work and his excellent Kiasmos project' – The Line Of Best Fit

CONTENT

Erased Tapes label mates Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm record and mix their first collaborative record between Reyjkjavík and Berlin as a surprise release for label founder Robert Raths.

The ambient/electronic work ‘Stare’ is a true family effort from Ólafur Arnalds and Nils Frahm with Anne Müller joining in on cello and all graphics by close label-friend and now in-house designer Torsten Posselt of Feld Studios.

This release will be strictly limited and exclusively available on Record Store Day 2012, April 21st. Coinciding with the 5th Anniversary of Erased Tapes, it’s also available from the official Erased Tapes online store and sure to become a must-have for fans of the label and these two artists.


CONTEXT

Words by Nils Frahm: 
‘I heard ‘Eulogy For Evolution’ for the first time 6 years ago and I was totally captivated. Impossible to know back then that I was supposed to meet Ólafur many years later as my label mate. Later when he took me along a tour of his we also noted that we kind of like hanging out together, doing important things like cover versions of long forgotten songs or eating veggie pizza. Also he would join my live set for a jam and I would return the favour by playing along with his set. 

All in all, I fell for Óli and after one memorable jam session we had in Berlin at Roter Salon in 2011, he finally proposed the idea to visit me in my studio in Berlin to work on 'some music'. I was happy and delighted about that idea, so we got together in April 2011 and after having a big pizza, I plugged in some old analogue synths and we played for four days until late in the night. Also queen Anne Müller stopped by after a show with Agnes Obel to record some cello at 5 am in the morning for ‘b1’. Making music together with people is lovely! 
 
The time I spent with Óli in Berlin made me very happy and the music wasn't like anything I have heard before. It was all very reduced and minimal and I felt like I couldn't have done this alone. So we decided to do another 4-day jam at Óli´s E7 studio in Reykjavik. So I flew there in the end of October to repeat the trick and record some out of this world ambient music. It didn't take us too long to write ‘a1’ and ‘a2’.  I can’t wait for the follow up!’

Words by Olafur Arnalds:
 ‘After having toured together and having had many inspiring late night conversations, I decided to visit Nils in his Durton Studio in Berlin for a weekend. We didn't have anything specific in mind, we just wanted to hang out, jam and eat some falafel. That's what we did, but somehow we also made 25 minutes of ambient bliss that weekend. 

After that we quickly decided we had to do the same in my studio in Iceland. Just hang out for a weekend and possibly make some music. So the album became kind of an Iceland vs. Berlin thing. I think you can hear it very well in the sound (side a vs. side b) and that is the most interesting thing about this record for me: that subtle but significant different in the characteristics of the music two people made in Iceland against what the same two people made in Germany. 

I'm not sure why we decided to keep it secret, it just happened. But it sure was fun! I remember a party at Robert's (Erased Tapes founder) flat in Berlin, where me and Nils stood in the corner the whole night whispering about the project. We then delivered the fully mastered record with finished artwork to Robert around the 5th anniversary of the label. It would have been nice to be there to see his face…"

The live video of Nils and Ólafur’s spontaneous improv live set in Berlin last summer won them many fans since, including UK electronic music producer Max Cooper who is now remixing two of his “absolute favourite artists”. Nils and Ólafur will be touring together throughout Europe this spring.

You can watch it here: http://vimeo.com/28631568
 


LABEL: ERASED TAPES RECORDS    UK RELEASE DATE: APRIL 21, 2012
CAT.NO: ERATP042 EP/DL   EAN: 4050486068137

TRACK LISTING:  1. a1  2. a2  3. b1

OFFICIAL WEBSITES:   OLAFURARNALDS.COM   DURTONSTUDIO.COM   ERASEDTAPES.COM 

Stare

Ólafur Arnalds & Nils Frahm - a2

The first side of Hot Cygnet Tape by Now Wakes the Sea.

Available now on The Geography Trip Recordings.

http://thegeographytrip.bandcamp.com/

HCT #1 by Now Wakes the Sea

The second side of Hot Cygnet Tape by Now Wakes the Sea.

Available now on The Geography Trip Recordings.

http://thegeographytrip.bandcamp.com/

HCT #2 by Now Wakes the Sea

Scarfolk Council is proud to announce its musical debut!
Here's "A Day at the Seaside" from the "Scarfolk Music & Audio Library Vol. 1" released in 1973(v.2.0).

Scarfolk Council - A Day at the Seaside

Back in 1975 the children of Scarfolk primary school released their own 45rpm record to commemorate their teacher Mrs Payne who disappeared in 1973, but whose body was found encased inside one of the thirteen ancient standing stones just outside Scarfolk. Proceeds from the sale of the single went toward the building of a new community coven and affiliated gift shop.

Children of Scarfolk Primary School - In the Playground with the Music Room Window Open 13.05.1975

For more about this field recording go here: http://www.scarfolk.blogspot.de/2013/03/field-recording-tim-seven-birds-summer.html
"Only seven tourists visited Scarfolk in the summer of 1972. Oddly, they were all called Timothy, wore identical clothes and appeared to communicate with each other telepathically. Everyone in Scarfolk called them 'The Tim Seven'.

Three days after they arrived in Scarfolk all the birds disappeared and for months after the Tims left whenever Scarfolk residents tried to use their telephones all they could hear on the other end was distant, frantic backward birdsong."

Some of you have expressed disbelief that these events occurred, which has vexed the mayor. He spent all afternoon rummaging around in the archives in search of one of the reels that were recorded at the time. So, for all you naysayers, here it is. This was recorded on the 4th July, 1972 from one of the council office telephones. This is the raw recording and has not been tampered with in any way.



Field Recording (04.07.1972):  'The Tim Seven' / Birds

The mayor has decided that it's time to hear more from Scarfolk's audio archive.

This post refers to a previous one about the disappearance of primary school music teacher Mrs. Payne whose body was found encased inside an ancient standing stone (go here for more detail)

Forensic examination of the stone revealed that it had originated more than 300 miles away and historians could not ascertain how prehistoric man had transported it to Scarfolk, much less how Mrs Payne had found her way into a 300 million year old rock. The police reported it as a chance accident.

When the stone was broken into chunks and sold as 'Payne's Pain' souvenirs in the Scarfolk gift shop, purchasers began hearing ghostly music in their homes. Additionally, the music was heard at the stone circle where Mrs. Payne's body was found, as well as at the geological site of the stone's origin.

The souvenirs were recalled and buried at the centre of the stone circle in Scarfolk fields, now the only location where the music can still be heard, but only on the anniversary of the death of Payne's husband who found himself unexpectedly dismembered during a pagan ritual competition for the under 10s.

This is a field recording made from the stone circle.

Drone Home

sstobbs