Spacerock #2 (postrock, math rock, krautrock, psychedelic electronica, etc)

Floating Memories

"Machine funk kraut-a-delia - it's rather lovely!" Andrew Weatherall

You’d be hard pressed to disagree with the seminal DJ and producer listening to  ‘Keep Warm… with the Warm Digits’ (Distraction Records), an album that comes as though arriving from a distant time, where music still only saw limitless horizons and endless sonic possibilities. Warm Digits’ duo Andrew Hodson and Steve Jefferis’ bewitching debut LP is undoubtedly steeped in the lineage of the 1970s experimentalism of the likes of Neu!’s hypnotic repetition and the open-minded philosophies of Brian Eno, but it’s testament to the pair’s own broad visions that in 2012 these touch stones have been sculpted into a sound that retains a refreshing sense of modern vitality.

Hodson and Jefferis are a trans-Pennines collaborative project – something referenced by the title of the track ‘Trans-Pennine Express’ - with both having history as mainstays of Newcastle and the North East of England’s intimate but ever evolving music community. Though Andrew has since moved to the more traditional cultural powerhouse of Manchester, he retains close links with the region, recently collaborating with old friends, Sunderland’s Field Music, to help them record the unique ‘One Copy’ in the North West’s Lauriston Gallery. It’s an album whose sole copy is owned by the creators as a statement against the free streaming and sharing culture becoming dominant in music and Field Music’s David Brewis returned the favour to his old pal appearing here on bass. Hodson also runs Seed Studios in Trafford and has worked as a producer with the likes of Maximo Park’s Paul Smith and modern folk duo Cath and Phil Tyler among others.

Jefferis for his part comes from a more glitch-electronica background, something that remains evident within the vortex of Warm Digits enveloping sound; previous releases from him have come under the name Cathode for the likes of Expanding Records, Static Caravan and Distraction Records. Combined the pair have taken their previous wanderings to a new level; forming whilst both still living in Newcastle, they developed from a techno-influenced laptop duo into a more panoramic, texturally aware couple after trying their hand at live score work for Canadian film maker Norman McLaren. Rehearsals for this saw the opening developments of what is now a thrilling semi-improvised brew of metronomic rhythms, snowstorm guitar and radiophonic electronics, dual-laptop electro, swathes of no-wave guitar and frantic free jazz drumming. It says much for their openness and mastery of such dexterity that their debut LP easily manages to contain these myriad influences, working them into a cohesive whole.

With previous remix work for Unkle and Maximo Park, existing fans including BBC Radio 6music’s Marc Riley and a newly blossoming live show that’s seen the pair support Goblin and Modeselektor to name just two - their 21st century krautrock hybrid is more than capable of crossing over to the dance floor.  Warm Digits look set to take the centre stage themselves in 2012, with ‘Keep Warm... with the Warm Digits’ set to make them hot property in the months to come.


Trans-Pennine Express

Weapons Destruction

From the Honey Devash LP on Mexican Summer (MEX086). 

www.mexicansummer.com/shop/date-palms-honey-devash/

Date Palms - Honey Devash (Edit)

Ancient Echoes- Eternal Tapestry

Track features on the album - Mirage
Released 14 October 2016

Rocket Store:
https://josefinohrnandtheliberation.bandcamp.com/

Itunes:
ttp://hyperurl.co/JosefinOhrnMirage 

Published on 19 July 2016
Artist: Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation
Tracks: In Madrid / Rainbow Lollipop
Album: Mirage
Catalogue Number: Launch096

C+P Rocket Recordings 2016

Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation - In Madrid / Rainbow Lollipop

Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation - Dunes

Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation - Rushing Through My Mind (Edit)

Full length version features on the album - Mirage
Released 14 October 2016

Single itunes
http://hyperurl.co/JosefinRTMM

Album Itunes:
http://hyperurl.co/JosefinOhrnMirage 

Rocket Store:
https://josefinohrnandtheliberation.bandcamp.com/

Published on: 30th SEPT 2016
Artist: Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation
Tracks: Rushing Through My Mind (Single Edit)
Catalogue Number: Launch106

C+P Rocket Recordings 2016

Josefin Öhrn + The Liberation - Rushing Through My Mind (Edit)

Physical: geographic-north.com/cassette/death-on-the-hour/
Digital: geographicnorth.bandcamp.com/album/death-on-the-hour-aural-apparitions-from-the-geographic-north
Catalog #: GN38
Wilted lilac cassette, limited to 100
Mastered by Sean McCann

Geographic North proudly presents 'Death on the Hour,' a ghastly collection of Halloween-inspired recordings intended to spook and seduce through every turn of the season. Spanning 11 harrowing tracks, Death on the Hour boasts a ghoulish smattering of Geographic North mainstays and a healthy dose of new blood weaving through original recordings as well as disfigured renditions of Halloween classics.

Arriving long past the witching hour, the looping vignette of Moon Diagrams’ (Deerhunter’s Moses Archuleta) “Omegaplex” repeats a curious and oddly familiar phrase of suspense not far removed from the "Opening Titles" of John Carpenter and Alan Howarth’s Prince of Darkness suite. Similarly, Leech's (Brian Foote, Peak Oil/100% Silk) "Utah" writhes in fits of rhythmic revulsion, perfectly soundtracking some doomed narrative of paranoia and peril. 

For a more spectral sense of evil, Windy & Carl's (Kranky, Music Fellowship, Darla) "Witch & a Cauldron" drifts in a cloud of black feedback and tonal haze proving once again that Dearborn's darling duo can find weightless beauty in a fit of foreboding harmony. Another product of the Great Lakes, Lansing’s Auburn Lull opens the B-side with “Unknown Color,” layering distant metallic clatter, muffled low-ends, shuffled static, and processed throat singing. It's a jazzy and noirish waltz through similar scenes haunted by Pan•American and Moritz von Oswald.

M. Sage (Patient Sounds) revises "I Put a Spell on You" into something equally mesmerizing, covering Screamin' Jay Hawkins' blues ballad into an unsettling bit of obscured, manic pulsing, lo-fi pop, while Lyonnais (Hoss Records, Geographic North) takes J.P. Shilo’s recent and stunning work "SLEEP" and re-imagines it into a majestic wide-shot of symphonic minimalism. An army of stringed instruments are bowed to their limits, holding on to the grim waking dream just long enough to make sense of it all. 

A warm and delirious trip through hauntingly alluring astral planes.

Moon Diagrams - Omegaplex

Spacemen, Can You Hear Me?

Eko Eko Azarak

Pulgasari

Pulgasari (I Am Become Death)

A Warm Digits remix of Maximo Park's song "Let's Get Clinical". Appears on the album "Quicken The Heart - Remixed", given away with NARC. magazine in July 2010, and streamed via maximopark.com

Lets Get Clinical - Warm Digits Remix

An early, transitional cut by The Nightcrawlers, recorded as a duo shortly before Dave Lunt completed the trio, “Luv-Li-Musik” (from 1982’s cassette Synthmania), released as a digital single from Anthology Recordings The Biophonic Boombox Recordings, showcases an unusually harder edge for the act’s patented electronic kozmik drift. That’s not to say that the Gulch Brothers had detoured into a precursor of fluorescent rave ala Manuel Göttsching’s E2-E4 (recorded a year earlier, and released two years later). Rather, the interlocking motifs of the track highlight the group’s interest in pattern music ala Steve Reich, who was an influence not only on The Nightcrawlers’ beloved Berliner Schule (of which Göttsching was a member), but also on the Philadelphia experimental scene centered around University of Pennsylvania radio station WXPN and Philadelphia’s Painted Bride Art Center. In it, you can hear the distinct quality each one of the two brought to the aggregation: rising and falling ambient beds, mysterious and lush, pillowing the intensity of Peter Gulch's hypnotically repetitive patterns, while Tom Gulch's minor key soloing pierces through, capturing the imagination.  So in tune to the talents of one another were The Nightcrawlers that “Luv-Li-Musik” is an improvisation that could easily pass as composition. And with the addition of Lunt and his experimental background, they would soon commence launch into the deepest regions of space.

The Biophonic Boombox Recordings

Learn More

The Nightcrawlers - Luv-Li-Musik

The Biophonic Boombox Recordings delves into the vast depths of The Nightcrawlers’ self-published cassette catalog to collect and reflect upon the pioneering synthesizer trio’s hard-knuckled brand of kosmische musik made on the rugged outskirts of Philadelphia throughout the ‘80s. Working with the band’s living members and from a cache of original cassettes, Anthology’s collection tells The Nightcrawlers’ story through sprawling space epochs and inspired liner notes complete with ephemera from a seldom seen era of electronic music. Double LP set comes with mp3 download.

Pre-Order

The Nightcrawlers - Geistesblitz

I was a teenage pattern dissolvent

"The Connected Coast" is taken from "Interchange", a Warm Digits album and series of films made for the project Half Memory. The work is based on images drawn from Tyne & Wear Archives of the 1970s construction programme for the Tyneside Metro system.

"Interchange" will be released as a CD + DVD set released on Distraction Records, with a live premiere at Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle, on 27 April 2013. 

More info about Half Memory here:
www.twmuseums.org.uk/halfmemory
A project by Tyne and Wear Archives, Tusk Music (www.tuskmusic.co.uk) and basic.fm

Warm Digits - warmdigits.co.uk
Distraction Records - distractionrecords.com

The Connected Coast

"Cut and Cover" is taken from "Interchange", a Warm Digits album and series of films made for the project Half Memory. The work is based on images drawn from Tyne & Wear Archives of the 1970s construction programme for the Tyneside Metro system.

"Interchange" will be released as a CD + DVD set released on Distraction Records, with a live premiere at Tyneside Cinema, Newcastle, on 27 April 2013. 

More info about Half Memory here:
www.twmuseums.org.uk/halfmemory
A project by Tyne and Wear Archives, Tusk Music (www.tuskmusic.co.uk) and basic.fm

Warm Digits - warmdigits.co.uk
Distraction Records - distractionrecords.com

Cut and Cover

With the deep love of early electronic music, Muhamad Fahri a.k.a Gonzo chooses to take a step closer to what Terry Riley, Ash Ra Temple, Klaus Schulze, Popol Vuh and other experimental music pioneers had experienced in the 20th century; the power of handling sound machines that is capable of creating limitless possibilities of sonic experimentation. 

Very much inspired by the beauty of the underwater world, Duck Dive organize a mixture of analog keyboard synthesizers, sequencer, and effects, to create live compositions of electronic music with a full layer of melodies, rhythm, and sound, mimicking a unique meditative atmosphere given by the life of the deep, blue ocean.

Duck Dive - Inner Projections

Taken from new album "Tiden" which is available at the Bureau B online shop:
http://shop.tapeterecords.com/records/bureaub/roedelius-schneider-tiden.html

-------------------------

ROEDELIUS SCHNEIDER - TIDEN (release date: June 28th 2013)

Not long after Hans-Joachim Roedelius (Cluster, Harmonia) and Stefan Schneider (To Rococo Rot, Kreidler, Mapstation) had released their first album "Stunden", accompanied by a few live shows in 2011, Eric Satie and Brian Eno were quoted as the great inspiration for their musical collaboration. Fine references no doubt, one having invented musique d'ameublement, and the other having refined it into ambient music 80 years later. Yet "Tiden" does not sit easily in either camp. This is neither tasteful decor (à la Satie), nor is it electronic-auditory space filler (à la Eno), gazing towards infinity. The short duration of the 13 pieces is enough to discount either genre. Better to consider these as concentrated, inspired études, carefully thought through and in no way random or sketchy.

With cheerful gravitas, the two artists create absolute music – music which desires only to be itself, without ulterior effects and with the declared intent of involving the listener in his emotional, inventive game. Perhaps Franz Schubert's moments musicaux would be a more suitable citation. The lightness and atmospheric intimacy of this music reveal Roedelius (grand piano, synthesizer) and the decades younger Schneider (Elektronik) as musicians who understand how to listen to one another and improvise on each other's ideas immediately. The result is a lively, relentless interplay of great composure, more surprising than any tide could be, as precise calendars exist for tidal flows.

Roedelius can already look back on a adventuresome career in music. Schneider has also prospered through exciting decades in contemporary pop. This is the second time their paths have crossed. "Tiden" keeps the promise which their first album made, genial contemporary music from two artists who are as one in heart and soul. And when Roedelius steps on the pedal of his grand piano, well it squeaks a little. (Asmus Tietchens)


About the musicians:

The electronic pioneer Hans-Joachim Roedelius lives in Baden near Wien (Austria) and is a legendary figure in popular music. He founded the seminal bands Cluster and Harmonia, which also included Dieter Moebius and Michael Rother. He produced the albums "Zuckerzeit" (1974) and "Deluxe" (1975), which are considered blueprints for today's electronica and were recently successfully reissued. And in the late 70s he worked with the great Brian Eno – the albums "Cluster & Eno" (1977), "After The Heat" (1978) and "Tracks & Traces" (1997) document the cooperation between the Bowie and U2 producer and the sound researcher who was then living in a creative commune in Forst.

Roedelius began releasing solo albums in 1978. He was already exploring the interplay between piano and electronics on his second LP, "Jardin au Fou" (1979). This synthesis is also the core of "Stunden". The Düsseldorf based Stefan Schneider was a founding member of Kreidler (1994â€“99) and is part of the trio To Rococo Rot. He has released several albums under the name Mapstation.

http://bureau-b.de/roedeliusschneider.php

Roedelius Schneider - Hohner Omen

Been blogging, music sharing, etc. for a while now (see blog under this name) & DJing since 1982. I like all kinds of music.

Most of my playlists are not organized & just hold songs I'm interested in, many of which I haven't listened to yet. The "freeform current listening" playlist is as it says & will be updated regularly. Many of my reposts were unintentional, they were just random tracks I was trying to add to a playlist using my phone & I've got clumsy fingers.

Spacerock #2 (postrock, math rock, krautrock, psychedelic electronica, etc)

PlayItAgainMax