Taken from 'Fringe' LP/Download (E064, Ecstatic 03/09/2021)

A gorgeous swell of intimate soundscaping from Felisha Ledesma on this simmering stunner for Ecstatic, despatching two extended, richly absorbing pieces weft from everyday detritius; synths, strings, voicemail, found sounds - hitting a similar spot for us as Ulla’s diaristic 'inside means inside me’ but with a more defined play of sound-as-light that gently and memorably tugs at the earlobes and heartstrings. 

Exploring a music of presence and ultra subtle inference, ‘Fringe’ is the 2nd release by Ledesma, student of Berlin's estimable Universität der Künste, following from a debut for Enmossed x Psychic Liberation earlier this year. Using AMQR - a software synthesiser built by Ledesma together with Ess Mattisson - both pieces here shimmer with elusive timbres that occupy a realm that feels lost between worlds - neither electronic nor acoustic, but more a sort of observational sound that radiates togetherness and warmth. 

Operating at insightful levels of synaesthesia, Ledesma poetically turns ostensibly humdrum sources into clouds of smoke - emails, voicenotes, walking along the water, a poem attached to an email, walking alone in New York during lockdown, going for a swim at sunset in the desert - all turn into a smudge of memory. When ‘Beamsplitters’ opens with a tangible human presence - a voicemail from a friend - it startles with its earthly pull, eventually getting lost in a tangled spool of found sound leaving just a trace of iridescent, intimate reverie. 

On ‘Golden Mirror’ Felisha gently diffracts a lonesome guitar phrase into a humming thizz with a steeply uncanny ability to jog the memory in a similar way to how olfactory stimulus can conjure feelings of nostalgia. It’s a trick familiar from an emergent new realm of lower case composers creating something like submerged, small scale symphonies that work counter to notions of classical excess or anodyne ambient, instead focusing on microcosmic, highly peronalised sort of worldbuilding that’s impenetrable, yet somehow entirely open.

Felisha Ledesma - Golden Mirror [E064]

With a strong interest in geology and biology, Takahashi started imagining the landscape and life of the Earth in prehistoric times based on fossils and illustrated books, later used as inspiration for his compositions. At first sight, these images make it easy to envision the ecosystems and environments of prehistoric Earth as so distinct from those of today that they could almost be seen as different planets. Living through the pandemic, when Takahashi first started composing the songs, made him rethink his initial thoughts. 

“The Palaeozoic era was a time of extinction, of prosperity and decline. When I think ab out these facts from geology, they are quite spectacular. But I felt that this cycle is still happening today, b ut on a different scale. If you think about the time before Covid-19, people were very active and free to move around. It was with this in mind that I set about writing the music, imagining what it would be like to overcome the social upheaval of Covid-19." 

It's the similarities between his initial analogy and the new pandemic reality that ultimately formed the main context for Paleozoic. This led Takahashi to make an album which sonically reflected the sequence of Paleozoic: starting from a time when life flourished in the sea ,before the arrival of life on land, to the gradual arrival of plants and insects on land and the end of an era due to change. 

In order to create a more vivid representation of the life force and grandeur of nature, Takahashi decided to forgo his signature lo-fi production style of using GarageBand on his Iphone. For this, he enlisted the help of sound engineer, producer and Atoris bandmate Kohei Oyamada with the mix and arrangements, resulting in a highly evocative, expansive sound palette. 

“With his techno sensibility and sound engineering skills, he was able to bring me closer to the sound I've been chasing, which is full of mystery, life and images of a wild and simple time. This record is the first step in my work with him and the foundation for further progress." 

The result is a fascinating journey through imaginary landscapes infused with great dramatic affect and an acute sense for details across sweeping drones and electronic glistens. 
credits
released April 29, 2022 

Composed by H. Takahashi 
Mix & arrangement by Kohei Oyamada 
Mastered by Taylor Deupree (vinyl) and Kohei Oyamada (digital) 
Artwork by Alicia Carrera

Emerald

In the wet heat of a Japanese summer, legendary musician Ryuichi Sakamoto was joined on stage by Taylor Deupree and the duo of Corey Fuller and Tomoyoshi Date, known as Illuha. The Yamaguchi Center for Arts and Media hosted the event as part of their 10 year anniversary which also included a captivating installation by Sakamoto called Forest Symphony. The days surrounding the concert brought the artists together for food, talk and exploration. Informal but meaningful moods that prepared them for performing together.

The performance, an improvised set for piano, guitar, pump organ, and synthesizers, ended up affecting the artists in a deep way. The four, having never played all together before, were taken aback by the level of listening and restraint that flowed between them. The audience sat in a breathless silence, the music offering a respite from the thick July air. As the last hushed note faded into blackness the artists knew right away it had been a deep journey.

It is a fortunate event when a moment like this is captured, as this concert was ( recorded in high quality DSD). Perpetual, named for the eternal and ageless quality of the music, is presented in three movements that traverse from soft layers of synthesizer and processed guitar, to open, airy sections of prepared piano and silence, to finally coming to rest in a most hauntingly delicate lullaby of lonely piano, crackling found objects and field recordings and tones suspended like mists.

Perpetual not only surrounds us and stretches through time but collects that expanse into a single memory, a record of a brief moment where time stood still and four musicians merged into one.

Perpetual

Movement, 3

This track is a symphony of little floating particles of your own origin, awakening a deep cellular memory of belonging. A repetitive, dreamy piano and celestial voices that feel like tiny, glowing particles floating in the air. This song is your doorway to your energetic home.

Carried By The Light

This album feels as if you drift away on a fluffy cloud, carried…. carried by the light.. Every song is a journey reminding you that Great Spirit is always with you. 

And if you allow yourself to deeply listen to the music, you can feel yourself being gently held. All sounds in this album are like little floating particles of your own origin, awakening a deep cellular memory of belonging. Each note is an invitation to surrender, to feel the unseen support that is always present. And the celestial voices are like a soft guide calling you home.

Particles of Origin

A building loop of a musical comfort blanket

I. 2c 
II. Flutter
III. Moments in Love

out 04.28.17 https://boomkat.com/products/grafts

GRAFTS

Single from Water Memory, out December 21st 2017.

preorder: mlesprg.bandcamp.com

/////////

Water Memory began as an imagination of the feelings that are floating through the natural world around us. It morphed and cycled and gained memories of my own which are now contained like those in all bodies.

Water Memory 1

First track from the new Jon Hassell album 'Listening To Pictures (Pentimento Volume One)' - Out now:
http://smarturl.it/listeningtopictures

pen·ti·men·to / noun
Reappearance in a painting of earlier images, forms, or strokes that have been changed and painted over.

Forty years since its creation, Jon Hassell's Fourth World aesthetic remains a powerful influence on modern electronic music. Continuing his lifelong exploration of the possibilities of recombination and musical gene-splicing, fragments of performance are sampled, looped, overdubbed and re-arranged into beguiling unexpected shapes. Hassell applies the painterly technique of ‘pentimento’ to the arrangements, teasing out texture by the overlaying of sound upon sound, or a carefully timed reveal of the delicate bones pinning the frame of a track together.

The release of this new album also sees the launch of Jon’s own label, Ndeya (pronounced “in-day-ya”), which will be a home for new work as well as well as selected archival releases, including re-presses of classic sides and some astonishing unreleased music.

FURTHER READING ON JON HASSELL:

Fourth World in the 21st century: https://www.residentadvisor.net/features/2984
Brian Eno on Jon Hassell: https://www.theguardian.com/music/2007/nov/09/jazz.urban
https://www.jonhassell.com/

Jon Hassell - Dreaming

Taken from the upcoming album Both Lines Will Be Blue, out July 12th on Smalltown Supersound. Produced by Carmen Villain. Flute performed by Johanna Scheie Orellana. Mastered by Matt Colton.

Observable Future

Stefan Fraunberger - Elegie
from the album "Quellgeister#3-Bussd" expected October 2019.

Composed, performed and produced by Stefan Fraunberger. 
Recorded in September 2016 except B3 and B4 in September 2018 in the fortified church of Bussd. Bellows pumped / interpreted by Johanna Magdalena Guggenberger except on track B3 and B4 by Nicolai Guta.
Mastered by Neel at Enisslab Studio, Rome
Cover Artwork by George Sowden - Designed by M-L-XL
Supported by SKE / Austro Mechana

doser034LP - Morphine Records 2019
All rights reserved to the respective owners.

Stefan Fraunberger's Quellgeister#3 Bussd is Recorded entirely on an abandoned church's organ in the village of Bussd, Romania, the album is the third installment of the series by Austrian artist and composer Stefan Fraunberger. His research on the influence of nature on culture touches on time, periphery, memory, and transience as evidenced in his Quellgeister research. The album is an archeological sonic research on the deteriorating Organ discovered in the saxon church in Transylvania.

Stefan Fraunberger - Elegie (doser034LP preview)

Out Woods

b.1986 Tokyo based  composer / architect
Other projects :  UNKNOWN ME , Atoris , H TO O

Emerald

H. Takahashi

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