Jasmine Moth

2021

In The Desert, Far Away

198875624 M - 1

artist: Rathrobin https://soundcloud.com/rathrobin
album: Ear to the Ground (NR016)
release date: 31st January 2022
duration: 36 minutes
edition: digital + limited edition CD

Naviar's first solo release of the year is the stunning concept album "Ear to the Ground" by electroacoustic duo Rathrobin.

Exploring the themes of memory and yearning, Ear to the Ground is a sonic journal of intertwined personal experiences: two nomadic authors pouring their creativity and feelings in a blank canvas that becomes a breathtaking collection of electroacoustic songs.

When Pier and Beth contacted me to release their album, I was mesmerized by the mood and poignancy of their soundscapes.
Ear to the Ground is cinematic music at its best: powerful and enveloping, inviting the listener on a journey that speaks of human nature, life, and personal evolution. Beth's voice gently guides us and hovers over Pier's captivating ambient layers, adding further depth to a multifaceted album that evolves together with the listener.

The main themes of ‘Ear to the Ground’ are time, memory and nostalgia, which are realized through textural, layered, emotive and evocative soundscapes.

During six years of collaboration, inevitably, the artists' own memories, experiences and lives were interwoven throughout the album, and their own, somewhat nomadic lifestyles reflected another significant theme of the album: the meaning of home.

Vocals, field recordings, digital and analogue instruments move through the album as a way for the artists and listeners to process experiences from the past and conjure thoughts of the future.

The album’s making was a long but consistent process and invariably included some periods of furious creativity and others of quiet contemplation.

About Rathrobin:

Beth Chesser (UK) and Pier Giorgio Storti (Italy) collaborated virtually, over a six-year period whilst simultaneously exploring the world, living in various countries. After meeting on Soundcloud they quickly began working on their first collaborative album, ‘Ear to the Ground’. Each are musicians in their own right, both have performed in live bands and a multitude of recorded musical projects. The collaboration sees Pier contribute his multi-instrumental aptitude with Beth’s vocals, and digital music compositions. All the tracks from their debut album have been recorded in various locations: Italy, UK, Singapore and Finland between 2015 and 2020.

Rathrobin - Ear To The Ground (teaser)

Natural Architecture moves the Frond sound into more rich and rhythmic territory than Frond's previous work. This piece still employs field recordings, home made textures and the idiosyncratic slow reveal, but really lets the synth do the talking. This tracks celebrates the inspiration that remote natural environments have on the human experience.

Natural Architecture

The Dying Miss Saeki (Den döende fröken Saeki) is the fourth and last movement in From the Bottom of a Well (Från botten av en brunn) based on Haruki Murakami's novel Kafka on the Shore. The the sounds were designed from, and the music was written from a grounded theory analysis of the book. The piece was performed and recorded on the 16th of December 2021 by Robert Ek, clarinet; Kevin Kirs Verstege, cello; and Rikard Vilhelm Lindell, eurorack at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm. Photography by Hannes Häfele.

Robert Ek's portfolio: www.remusik.se/
Hannes Häfele's portfolio: luminea.eu/

Video recording from the concert is available here: https://vimeo.com/716690521

Den döende fröken Saeki / The Dying Miss Saeki

Mixed Signals

shards

i wish i could go back in time
wonder what i'd find
in the corners of a life turned mess
wonder how i'd feel if i confessed
what is it that you hate about this guy

what is wrong with the way i pray
are my expectations in the way
or does it just take time for god to have his say
what does heaven make of me
am i even to receive a key

i wish i could go back in time
wonder what i'd find
in the corners of a life turned mess
wonder how i'd feel if i confessed
what is it that you love about this guy

how do you even see
in all these shards
you call a memory 
am i really still that real to you
am i just one trauma in a self harm queue

did i not love
did i not pay
did i not suffer
do i not pray
am i not worthy
am i not right
am i not just as lost as you

shards

Shards

https://open.spotify.com/album/7vNUp2Tn7peH5vxXQpuPEu

Yawwu

(changed from Good Morning Good People out of reverence for Mark 10:17-22)

Good - Morning - Beloved

 	                  Don Bikoff - Celestial Explosion

Don Bikoff released one lone, rare solo album, 'Celestial Explosion', on Keyboard Records in 1968, now reissued on LP/CD/DL by Tompkins Square. Watch the YouTube video of Bikoff playing on the Ted Mack Amateur Hour, taped May 12, 1968. You'll see the sheepish, long-haired, mustachioed musician spinning gold in a style (still?) so foreign to the mainstream listener. The befuddled host concludes after Don's performance, "That's unusual to say the least." A kid from Oyster Bay, LI, Bikoff got his start in Greenwich Village, annoying Dave Van Ronk and playing the folk/blues circuit where he met Sonny Terry & Brownie McGhee, Jesse Fuller and Mississippi John Hurt. The comparisons to John Fahey's and Robbie Basho's work stated in the LP liner notes touched a nerve with Fahey himself at the time. Today, those comparisons are still inevitable, however they are for lazy ears. Bikoff has his own approach. 

Celestial Explosion

TompkinsSquare