The first press release of Why Not Ltd back in 2005

:-)

WHY NOT LTD:

40 copies limited edition cdr.

CAUTION:: The production of this label MIGHT BE extremely ARTSY-FARSY !!

U will be very happy to have one of this cdr because it is only limited to 40 copies and NEVER will reproduced by the same label again. (The artist has the right to reproduced the produc elses where but u know it will be DIFFERENT).

Label's History:: History is written by left hand, only left-handed can do it. The owner of this label is not.

* All profits make out of the product will go direct to the owner's pocket, the artist will not get a single cent. And the owner hold the right NOT to release any product of any artist for NO reason.

NO Consignment, cash on delivery. Trade are NOT WELCOME unless u pay for the postage.

Interview on Herbal Records and Why Not Ltd: New Straits Times, Malaysia, November 2005

00001 LAU Mun Leng:: antiseptic

Lau Mun Leng:: antiseptic
Release date: May 2005

Lau Mun Leng: Keyboard
Recorded by the artist on 5Apr @ Studio 1, ASS, Stuttgart, Germany.
(click to see full size cover image)

Malaysian artist LAU Mun Leng mainly working visual art: Drawing, painting, video, installation, interative performerd and conceptual art. But she also working on music/ sound too. This is her third release, and new release since 2002. More works by LAU Mun Leng.

click HERE to make your order

Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 519
Much more conceptual is the release by Lau Mun Leng. She is foremost a visual artist, but also plays music. She recorded 'Antispectic' in april last year and it's strange release. She plays keyboard on this release. The first track is just a very short rhythm loop and third track sounds like an electronic pulse sounding like water - or vice versa. In between the second is very long piece for static sine wave, the kind of stuff that Sachiko M is well-known for. Played softly it's not so bad, as the frequencies fly nicely through your space, but I can imagine that a louder volume this is most irritating.
(FDW)

00002 Jean-Luc Guionnet / Pascal Battus:: Toc Sine

Jean-Luc Guionnet & Pascal Battus:: Toc Sine
Release date: July 2007

Jean-Luc Guionnet & Pascal Battus: électrics & electronics
recorded in Montreal, August 2005

Many Thanks to Martin Tétreault

one drawing by Jean-Luc Guionnet and one by Pascal Battus.

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Related resources:
Also by Jean-Luc Guionnet
Jean-Luc Guionnet: Non Organic Bias

Also by Pascal Battus
Pascal Battus: Simbol / L'Unique Trait D' Pinceau

Geographically connected
Eric Cordier / Seijiro Murayama: Nuit
Eric La Casa: W2
Eric La Casa / Cédric Peyronnet: La Creuse
Eric Cordier: Osorezan

Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 589
In terms of music the final release might be the most interesting one. 'Electrics and electronics', recorded in Montreal two years ago, this improvisation duet between Jean-Luc Guionnet and one Pascal Battus is also a pretty noise related affair in which a turntable is used and abused. The two keep the noise under control quite a bit, letting things hiss, scratch, beep and occasionally things go out of control, which is o.k. as it fits the scheme quite nicely. It misses the conceptual edge of Fuchs, but it makes it well up in terms of improvised noise.
(Frans De Waard)

00003 NMM (Mattin / Lucio Capece):: No More Music

NMM (Mattin / Lucio Capece):: No More Music
Release date: July 2005

Lucio Capece: mixer feedback modified by saxophone,bass clarinet, microphones.
Mattin: computer feedback running free software

Live at KULE, Berlin 11april 2005.

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00004 Tim BLECHMANN:: M

Tim BLECHMANN:: M
Release date: August 2005

1. 121
2. 171
Tim Blechmann, laptop & turntable
Recorded live at Moka Bar Studio, January 2005.

Tim is working on the new computer music program NOVA.

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00005 Mr. Guignol Dangereux:: Live By The Sea

Mr. Guignol Dangereux:: Live By The Sea
Release date: September 2005

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Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 519
The odd one in this bunch is the release by Guignol Dangereux, whose release is also an odd ball in his back-catalogue. So far his releases showed an intelligent form of ambient industrial music in combination with technoid rhythms, this one, apparently recorded 'live by the sea' is a pretty straight forward techno trip of ongoing rhythms, doing the usual 4/4 stuff. Although for what it is its not bad, but it's a bit too regular underground techno stuff, one you can hear at your underground rave every Saturday night, but it would have been nicer to see what Guignol Dangereux could do with his real (?) music in a live context.
(Frans De Waard)

00006 Juto Aviten:: water music#1

Juto Aviten:: water music#1
Release date: October 2006

a molecule is the smallest particle of a pure chemical substance that still retains its chemical composition and properties. A molecule consists of multiple atoms joined by shared pairs of electrons in a covalent bond. It may consist of atoms of the same chemical element, as with oxygen gas (O2), or of different elements, as with water vapor (H2O). Abstractly, a single atom may be considered a molecule, as it is when referred to collectively with molecules of multiple atoms, but in practice the use of the word molecule is usually confined to chemical
compounds, of multiple atoms.
it’s not art nor science it’s poesis!
J.A.

apo33

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Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 546
The most unknown one here is Juto Aviten. No information here whatsoever, just the cover saying 'made with water...', which is indeed clearly to be heard. Water drips a little bit here, and gets somewhere along the line a computer treatment by Aviten. Deep bass made via forms of extreme filtering, a very occasional high end tone, which seem to be arriving more in the second half of this forty-five minute piece, when the real water sounds are long gone. I don't believe it's Aviten's idea to play a piece of music, but rather playing a large block of sound that works as an environment, that can be played at a low volume and will fill your own environment quite nicely. Played loud and paid with lots of attention, this work isn't that strong.
(FdW)

00007 John Kannenberg:: Autumn Enso

John Kannenberg:: Autumn Enso
Release date: August 2005

Sonic and visual artist John Kannenberg (b.1969) has been exhibiting art and performing music for more than fifteen years. His major audio and visual works deal with a variety of themes including primal natural forces, spirituality and mindful contemplation, melancholy and nostalgia, abstracted narrative tales, and the confluence of sonic and visual art.

John has performed, exhibited and curated work in the United States, Europe and Australia, including appearances at the 2004 International Symposium on Electronic Art in Tallinn, the 2004 Biennale of Electronic Arts in Perth, the 2004 Version Festival in Chicago, the 2003 Placard Festival in New York, the 2002 MAXIS festival in Sheffield, and several broadcast appearances on Resonance 104.4 FM in London. He has released recordings on the Crouton, Topscore, Retinascan, Earlabs and Grain of Sound labels, and has been one of a rotating group of co-presenters of the Something Else radio program on WLUW 88.7 FM in Chicago.

Since April 2002, John has served as creator, designer and curator of Stasisfield.com, an experimental music label and interdisciplinary digital art space presenting works by a diverse collection of artists from around the globe.

John Kannenberg

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Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 501
The enso is a stark black circle of ink, known from Japanese calligraphy and one of the important symbols of zen. John Kannenberg saw examples in an exhibition and was inspired to make enso using autumn leaves. These leaves were then put in a circle around instruments that are circles: a snare drum, hi-hat and crash cymbal. The snare drum was covered with rice paper. That's the basic set-up by which Kannenberg plays his music. Drum sounds as such are not in there, except maybe for the percussive opening sounds of 'Prelude'. Each of the six pieces are low humming beauties of drone music. It's hard to tell what it that he does exactly, by what means of processing, but he slabs out some truly beautiful pieces of overtones sounds, ringing and buzzing around, like a continuous semishigure. As pieces of music that are inside drone music, even when the entire process seems to be made with computer. Microsound with a capital M (I'm sure the lowercase posse will be offended by this). Some great stuff on there.
(FdW)

0008 Dan WARBURTON:: A Walk Through R/ A Walk Through V

Dan WARBURTON:: A Walk Through R/ A Walk Through V
Release date: June 2005

A Walk Through R::
soundfiles sourced in field recordings made in Saint Remèze, Ardèche, France, May 2003.
A Walk Through V::
soundfiles sourced in field recordings made in Vier Bordes, Hautes Pyrénées, France, August 2003.


After studies at Cambridge University and a Harkness Fellowship to pursue a doctorate in Composition at the Eastman School of Music (Rochester NY), Dan Warburton settled in Paris in 1988. In 1992 he was awarded the Lili Boulanger Prize for Composition, and subsequently was commissioned to write for the Composers Ensemble (UK) and the Newt Hinton Ensemble (NL). Since 1997 he has been Editor in Chief of the Paris Transatlantic web magazine, and also writes regularly for The Wire (UK) and Signal To Noise (US). As a performer he has recorded with Jean-Luc Guionnet, Edward Perraud, François Fuchs, Bruno Meillier, Eric La Casa, Nikos Veliotis, Fred Blondy, Martine Altenburger, Jean Sé Mariage, Arthur Doyle and Reynols, for labels including Tzadik, Wergo, Leo, Ayler, Chloe, Absurd, Durtro, SMI, Crouton, Meniscus, Creative Sources, Not Two. He has also performed with John Butcher, Hans Tammen, Radu Malfatti, Kyle Bruckmann, Scott Rosenberg, Greg Kelley, Bhob Rainey, Tetuzi Akiyama, Daniel Erdmann, Bertrand Gauguet, Bertrand Denzler, Pascal Battus, Alan Courtis, Aaron Moore; Alan Licht, Aki Onda, Alex Bellenger and Jac Berrocal.

Dan Warburton

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00009 GOH Lee Kwang:: S.O.S. #1

GOH Lee Kwang:: S.O.S. #1
Release Date: July 2005

S.O.S. (Sound of Solitude) is a project by Goh Lee Kwang during his stay in Akademie Schloss Solitude as "sound/ music" fellow (2004~2005, 15months). He did field recording around the castles of Solitude in Stuttgart which on the top of the hill and surrounded by forest.

Goh Lee Kwang

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00010 Lukas Simonis: Collaborations

Lukas Simonis: Collaborations
Release Date: March 2006

track1; Reduced by Users
Greg Malcom - guitar, Lukas Simonis - guitar, electronics
Recorded, november 2003 & mixed, september 2004 by LS, L6S Studio

track 2; ZDF3 Better
Anne laBerge - electronics, flute, Lukas Simonis - guitar, electronics
Recorded & mixed by LS; first half of 2001, L6S Studio

track3; Menem3
Rohan Thomas - electronics. Lukas Simonis - electronics
Recorded & mixed by LS & Rohan thomas, october 2001, L6S Studio

track4; Get In The Pan Duck
Huib Emmer - guitar, Lukas Simonis - guitar
Recorded & mixed by LS, january 2004, L6S Studio

track 5; 222.222
Hilary Jeffery - trombone, Claudia Kapp - electronics, Nina Hitz - cello, Lukas Simonis - guitar, electronics.
Recorded & mixed by LS november 2003, L6S studio

track6; JULU #3
Julia Eckhardt - violin, Lukas Simonis - guitar
Recorded & mixed by LS, october 2004, L6S Studio

track7; A Cursing Brain #3
Henk bakker - electronics, Lukas Simonis - electronics
Recorded & mixed by Henk Bakker & LS, september 2001, L6S Studio

track8; H. Art. I Q late
Paolo Angeli - guitar, Lukas Simonis - guitar
Recorded & mixed by LS, march 2001, L6S Studio

track9; Their Very N Comb
Lucas Niggli - drums, percussion, Lukas Simonis - guitar
Recorded in Uster, Switserland, september, 2005, mixed by LS, october 2005 at L6S Studio

track10; Steamboat # 61
Paul Dunmal - bagpipes, Lukas Simonis - ebow guitar
Recorded at Steim, Amsterdam by John Richards, november 2002, remixed at the Hilcave by Hilary Jeffery

total time; 57 minutes
thanks; everybody involved, leeKwang, Fonds Voor Scheppende Toonkunst

Lukas Simonis has his roots as an instrumentalist and musical 'activist' in the industrial music and noise rock of the Eighties ( Throbbing Gristle, the Residents, Pere Ubu, Sonic Youth and beyond).Being a part of the Rotterdam jazzbunker scene (a collective that consisted of heavy drug induced punk rockers, freejazzers, early electronic musicians and pre-postrock combo's) he discovered the delimited world of improvisation. In the meantime he played in bands like Dull Schicksal, Trespassers W and Morzelpronk. At the same time he was writing for underground magazines like Trespassers W, Opscene, Mondain Den Haag and the Koekrandt as well as organizing concerts, events and films, first at the Jazzbunker in Rotterdam later on the Dissonanten festival, the Dissidenten festival, Popifilm, Dodorama and finally WORM, a multimedia centre for experimentel art.

Nowadays he is still doing a mixture of all these influences/periods, he collaborates with lots of people from different backgrounds. For instance; Apricot My Lady (with Ann La Berge and the Bohman Brothers), Vril (with Bob Drake and Chris Cutler), Goh Lee Kwang (Kuala Lumpur), Jim Whelton (London). Pierre Bastien(Paris/Rotterdam), Coolhaven (with Peter Fengler and Hajo Doorn), The static Tics (with Henk Bakker) and Liana Flu Winks (with Wilf Plum and Nina Hitz). He also makes programs and productions for WORM.

Collaborations’ is his first ‘solo’ release, a result of the countless encounters with fellow-musicians, mostly in studio L6S, that sharpened and shaped Simonis’ thoughts about improvisation.

First of all it is a studio-record; allthough all the material is improvised on the spot, there’s been some editting and mixing; the final result being a listenable thing, rather the an ‘expressive’ or conceptual effort.

Soon-to-be released; ‘Stots’ (z6 records) –the ‘real’ solo CD with Simonis on all instruments (mostly guitar that is).

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00011 Jeff GBUREK:: REALISM AND THE REVOLUTION IN RECORDED SOUND

Jeff Gburek:: REALISM AND THE REVOLUTION IN RECORDED SOUND ... delicated to Otomo Yoshihide
Release Date: October 2005

Jeff Gburek, based in Berlin, Germany, splinters electric guitar signals with analog modular tools, c-sound, and other open or deconstructed applications, processing field recordings and taking the legacy of musique concrete, electro-acoustic improvisation and indeterminate composition for a blind ride in one-way cab with a bullet plugged straight through the meter. For 7 years he has worked with movement artist Ephia in Djalma Primordial Science, damning expections with their unique style of theater stripped to bone. Appearances with Keith Rowe, Michael Vorfeld, Tetuzi Akiyama, Kyle Bruckmann, Pascal Battus, and Tom Carter (Charalambides), catch him at the cross-roads of improvised, electro-acoustic and experimental music. His solo CD “Energariums” was released by Nur Nicht Nur in 2004 and further recordings on his own label Orphan Sound are available through Metamkine in France and Erstwhile in the USA. He has recently been re-orienting his electronic environment at STEIM, one of the major European electronic music foundations, in Amsterdam, September 2005.

Band I: Popularity, Punctuation and Modern Classical Values
Band II: Repetitive Violence as a Vehicle for Higher Education
Band III: The Patterns of Silence & Repression
Band IV: I only Live in Order to Make the Next Mistake

Materials/Discards/Malfunctions/Diseases/Deformations: Jeff Gburek & Hym Kultjah.

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00012 Emmanuel Mieville:: Balok Night Birds

Emmanuel Mieville:: Balok Night Birds
Release Date: September 2005

Emmanuel Mieville french composer born in Paris, musical studies at the GRM (Groupe de recherches musicales) in the « musique concrète » field. Sound engineer school, wich influenced his tropism towards sound scapes, sound sculpting and gathering of spatials tools for compostion. Practice for two years of Javanese gamelan orchestra , and thus interested in melting ethnic intruments into electroacoustic music (among others, compostion of a music for japanese flute, voice, and electronics, commissioned by Radio-France).

The musical direction for this album is to give the listener a split up experience of soundscapes, both in the exotic tropical world and in the more tempered european climates.

And again, inside these european fields, a distinction was made between the first two tracks, as to yield an intimate and mysterious organic climate in « Herbal dripping », and a vast, large focus evolving soundscape in « La perle noire ». And the other part of the album is dedicated to my journeys, and give the title « Tropical soundscapes with urban spirit ».

Track #1 field recording made in Normandy, France. With plastic bags and water dripping, mixed with vinly scratches and found objects treated with filters.

Track #2 field recording made inside an oyster park in St Nazaire, France. Immerged in ocean water, with the microphones near the surface. The small squeaking sounds are those of oyster shells against waves.

Track # 3 was recorded in Kuantan, Malaysia. At the South China sea cost, the beach at night, surrounded with mangrove trees filled with birds chanting, and distant kids voice playing. All other sounds, except the wooden rythm at the begining, are urban field recordings and electronic patterns.

Track #4 was recorded in the forest of San José, Peru. Additinal recorded in Kuantan, Malaysia. Many urban sounds were treated with FFT driven filters, giving harmonics and white noise blur.

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00013 W98 Happy Beats

W98:: Happy Beats
Release Date: June 2008

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00014 Murmansk:: Murmansk (1st album reissue)

Murmansk:: Murmansk (1st album reissue)
Release Date: November 2007

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00015 PHROQ:: Esthetism Of Randoms

PHROQ:: Esthetism Of Randoms
Release Date: November 2005

1. Spanish/Swiss artist Francisco Meirino has started the music project Phroq in 1994.

2. He has released more than 30 albums (cd-cdr-vinyl) all over the world, has collaborated with many artists (music-dance-video), performed live in Europe, Japan, Usa.

3. His music, at first harsh noise, has evolved into a complex and consrantly changing electronic soundscape. The tension and precision of his dynamic electroacoustic music is fascinating, always alternating between suspicious calmness and intense noise.

4. Francisco Meirino explores the tension between emptiness and fullness. His works constantly swings from silence to noise, from peace to chaos.

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Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 519
The Herbal Records, owned by Goh Lee Kwang, is slowly expanding their catalogue, beyond the work of Goh himself. There is a regular series of Herbal Records and a series of limited CDRs in an edition of just forty copies. That seems like a rather low key affair, but apparently attractive enough for musicians to join in. Some of these artists have already made their name in the world of CDR and MP3 releases. People like Phroq for instance. In many of his work the use of field recordings play an important role. On his release he has four sounds running at the same time and some random filter to process his sounds. The original field recordings disappeared almost entirely from the scene and is replaced by the static crackle and hiss of the computer filters, sometimes being under attack by the deep drone bass of a refrigerator coming alive. Quite nice.
-Frans De Waard-

00016 Torturing Nurse:: 192171-200871

Torturing Nurse:: 192171-200871
Release Date: September 2008

Youki: Electronic
Junky: Electronic

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Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 646
buy this! It starts as a fairly laid back racket of feedback and clanging - live I suspect - the guitar needs tuning and there is a serious mains loop hum (joke) by track 3 they are beginning to wind themselves up - hell they have what I think is called a groove going- its splendid stuff- the kind of noise that brings a smile - you just know they are touching 80mph and there is more power left - this is a fucking Harley Davidson of a disk- they ease the throttle on 4 only to open it back up into more feedback (excellent) on 5, 6 eases out into a field recording??? Brilliant - see for yourself - and weep. Chinas rising! http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=HT7WgvzfojQ (clear enough?)
- jliat -

00017 Roel Meelkop:: HARAMU/Drempel

Roel Meelkop:: HARAMU/Drempel
Release Date: October 2oo5

Sato Endo / concept and direction
Kim Zieschang / décor and performance
Roel Meelkop / sound performance and composition
Gigi Suarez and Tawny Andersen / performance
Hiroaki Kanai / costume
Herman Venderickx / light
Premiered in May 2003 at Las Palmas, Rotterdam
Co-production: Theater Lantaren/Venster and Kruizenga & Wannenmacher, Rotterdam
With support of Dans in Kortrijk, Belgium
Recorded live on May 25th 2003 at Las Palmas, Rotterdam by Roel Meelkop
Audio mastering by Goh Lee Kwang

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Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 499
If I'm not mistaken this is the first Roel Meelkop release that comes on a CDR, but that's not the only thing that is different than many of his previous works. 'Haramu/Drempel' is a live recording of a bigger, multi-media event that incorporated dance, customs, performances and lighting. Meelkop's part was to do the sound design of it all, which if understood correctly means to rework the sound of the participants in this event. So by no means it's the usual computerized treatments of field recordings and electronics, which is the trademark sound of mister Meelkop. In this seventy-three minute piece you hear voices (without hearing what they say), metallic sounds and objects falling to the floor. Somewhere along the lines there is also the usual Meelkopian unearthly rumblings, but it's incomparable to his other releases. More a document of an event, and at that it's perhaps to regret that this is not a DVD(-R) release showing the entire thing. But at 'just' a musical document this is quite nice too. Best to be played as an environmental recording by itself and let it fill your space.
(FdW)

00018 Goh Lee Kwang:: Cicadas

Goh Lee Kwang:: Cicadas
Release Date: September 2008

Goh Lee Kwang

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00019 Ishigami Kazuya:: Siz U Ka

Ishigami Kazuya:: Siz U Ka
Release Date: March 2006

Born in 1972 , in Osaka,Japan.
in his high school days, Ishigami made psychedelic music and made his own band. Then, he also began to listen to contemporary music and to compose pieces of musique concrete.

He was graduated from Osaka University Of Arts in 1994, B.A. Music Engineering. He composed and performed his pieces in INA-GRM in August 1997. He also participated in a organization "ACTE KOBE", which consisted of activities in Kobe (Japan) by artists who wished reconstruction of Kobe from the earthquake catastrophe in Hanshin-Awaji areas in 1995. His performance for ACTE KOBE was improvisations in Theatre d?fAlhambra, Marseille, January 1999 and in Dampfzentorale, Berne, March 2000.(Artist Fellowship, Supported by The Japan Foundation.). He founded artists group "C.U.E." in Kobe , with Sunao Inami(Musician) and Emi Makino(Dancer) in Dec/2001, also he organize Internet live performance events[Live from Far East] every 1~2times from "C.U.E.". He started Workshop "Noise Work Shop" in Osaka, with Tadatsu Atsunobu(Noise musician / He is Leader of Noise Work Shop.) and Toru Kai(Noisician) in 2002. He did sound performance [etc] with Johannes.S.Sistermanns at MEX Dortmund(Dortmund), LOGOS Foundation(Gent), crossovermedia(Wuppertal), EKO-House(Duesseldorf), Gare du Nord(Basel), CUBA(Muenster), Stadtgarten(WDR, Koln), t-u-b-e(Muenchen) in Sept-Oct/2002.(Artist Fellowship, Supported by The Japan Foundation.). He did sound performance [etc2003] with Johannes.S.Sistermanns at Galerie Rachel Haferkamp(Koln), Lange Nacht der Museen (Teehaus/Japanischer Garten in Kaiserlautern), Kunsthaus(Wiesbaden), Kunstlerhaus(Saar/SR Radio, Saabrucken) in May-June/2003. He did sound performance [etc2004] with Johannes.S.Sistermanns at Senkoji(Osaka/Japan), Honen-in(Kyoto/Japan) and CAPHOUSE(Kobe/Japan) in Oct/2004.

Played with various artists such as Johannes.S.Sistermanns, Hans Koch, Barre Phillips, Cristin Wildbolz, Margrit Rieben, Ian Masters, Raymond Boni, Cor Fuhler, Sunao Inami, Masayuki Akamatsu, Tatsu Saito, Kazumoto Endo, Anla Courtis (REYNOLS), THIRDORGAN, Atsunobu Tadatsu, Kosei Yamamoto, Roberto Zorzi, Timothy O'Dwyer, Will Guthrie, Gunter Muller, Norbert Moslang (Voice Crack), Jazzkammer, Mr.Natural and many others. CD collaborations with various artists such as Erdem Helvacioglu, Johannes.S.Sistermanns, Tomas Kober, Sunao Inami, Masayuki Akamatsu, Atsunobu Tadatsu, Ian Masters, Mourmansk 150, Timothy O'Dwyer and THIRDORGAN.. and many others.. Future projects include cd collaborations with GOVERMENT ALPHA, Kazumoto Endo analog suicide.

He presides an independent label, NEUS-318, which is releasing many CDs of various artists.

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00020 Tim Blechmann:: Replugged

Tim BLechmann:: Replugged
Release Date: October 2008

Recorded at Mokabar October 2006.

http://www.tim.klingt.org

Come with 2 different covers especially designed by Austrian video / sound artist Manuel Knapp.

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Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 649
Tim Blechmann we heard before through some highly experimental and conceptual releases dealing with electronics and turntables. That is what he does here as well. Lots of hiss from the turntable are fed through the computer where it receives a minimal treatment. There is something happening for sure, but it takes Blechmann a lot of time. Too much time if you’d ask me. The release that lasts over an hour could have been easily be twenty minutes and been a nice 3" CDR release.
(Frans De Waard)

The Watchful Ear
... This latest one, Replugged follows in the vein of his previous work which is centred around gradually changing, often low, bass heavy drones. If that description doesn’t sound so great I can only say that Belchmann’s choice of sounds is excellent, working within a very subtle narrow range.
(Richard Pinnell)

00021 Atmen Im Atom:: Atom Heart Noise III

Atmen Im Atom:: Atom Heart Noise III
Release Date: April 2009

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Review(s)
Vital Weekly, 678
The art work for this is an A4 photocopied sheet wrapped around a CDR. If you folded the sheet so as to insert it in a jewel case then the cover would be the wrong way around. Doris Boeker gets the credit for this, the text also has the caution that the CDr contains extreme Frequencies and unexpected Dynamic Processes. Well it (Track 1) starts in the bass - with a bubbling sounds (custard?) then slowly and predictably moves up the spectrum. Track two is whistles and hisses and crashes with reverb - as opposed to rhubarb. The other tracks continue in this industrial vein - with the occasional high pitched noises but never more than 22khz (which would be something?) Not that its particularly relevant but the worst/best thing on Audio CDs is fairly fixed high DC offsets - which can in some cases burn out speakers.
(jliat)

00022 Mathias Forge:: Essai

Mathias Forge:: Essai
Release Date: April 2009

Pieces for 12 tape recorder, 4 sticks and 1 audio K7.
It's a sound work from the "puff", the motors and the defects of each tape recorders, amplified by the sticks. The recording is made on a K7, and the piece is composed directly with the button "pause". Not really improvised, but not so composed; a rustic project which cannot be played as a concert.

Note: this album will be in edition of 70 copies.

Bio:
Descendant of a sawers long family, Mathias is definitly roannais (from Roanne, France). It is thanks to an upright piano and a cap he began by some semblances of Thelonious Monk imitations, to finally go and lost himself with joy in free improvisation he pratctices regularly with Cyril Epinat (DUO…), ISHTAR collective (Masal Caldi), Emilie Borgo (Skratroum), Xavier Saïki (Sapiens), Olivier Toulemonde and Christine Sehnaoui (CMO); and irregularly with anyone wants to.

He plays the trombone and the radios, prepares the piano (always upright), but doesn’t fail to perform with dancers, painters, poets and skaters, or to have fun with some sound massages aid of a device built with some parts of the trombone. He still likes composing or arranging when he’s allowed to or when someone asks him to (cf : La Baskour, Quatuor MONK, Quatuor PLI, and others one-off projects) and wanders with pleasure in streets and public places with Les Arcandiers or the Cie Jeanne Simone.

He believes to authenticity, archaic abstraction and small things.

He was lucky of meeting ARFI, Li Ping Ting, Heddy Boubaker, Axel Dörner, David Chiesa, Luca Venitucci, Birgit Ulher, Dennis McNulty,… and had the honnor to let himself influenced by Jean Cohen, Sebastien Coste, Etienne Roche, the ISHTAR collective, the Kafé Myzik and his brother. That is with his three friends from Roanne he tries to buckle a buckle organizing couple of events about improvisation in the roannaise country (MICRO, Musique Improvisée en Côte Roannaise).

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Review(s)
Vital Weekly, 678

A new name, Mathias Forge, who, according to the cover, uses 12 tape recorders and 4 magnets. The three pieces here were recorded in October 2008. No instruments are mentioned, so its a bit unclear what it is what Forge does here. The music is at times noise based, feedback howls every now and then, but Forge keeps control all the time, and then the sound sinks back into sheer silence. Its music that comes to the listener as a sound collage, with the sound bouncing back and forth between harsh noise and sheer silence. This works best in 'Essai 8', where the silence prevails over the noise part. Nice stuff, though not great or brilliant.

00023 Julien Skrobek & Miguel Prado:: American Nightmare

Julien Skrobek & Miguel Prado:: American Nightmare
Release Date: March 2009

01 14'53"
02 24'58"

Miguel Prado: Prepared Cello (01), Prepared Piano (02)
Julien Skrobek: Synthesizer

Recorded 01-02/2009

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Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 672
A duet of Julien Skrobek on synthesizer and Miguel Prado on prepared cello (first piece) and prepared piano (second piece). Both seem to me new stars on the front of improvised music, department 'soft' and 'silent'. They play their music with 'gaps' in between. A sound, maybe two or even three, and then some silence. Its a method they apply in both tracks here, and it works well, even if perhaps both could have been a bit shorter. Or perhaps just the second, which lasts twenty-five minutes, would have been fine enough, I think. Its music that demands quite a bit from the listener and requires full attention, so even at just under forty minutes, this is still on the long side. But as said, especially the second piece I really liked.
(Frans De Waard)

The Watchful Ear
So as promised, a few words about Miguel Prado and Julien Skrobek’s American Nightmare CDr release on the Why Not label. Before mentioning the music, a few words on the mini-furore (if half a dozen or so people getting upset can be called a furore) that sprang up at the I Hate Music forum in response to the sleeve image and brief liner notes that accompany the disc.

Julien and Miguel are politically motivated people. The liner notes talk about the commodification of improvised music, the fact that music has become a marketable object, and that the worth of that object is judged by aesthetic criteria laid down as part of a “new orthodoxy,” the heart of which stems from the USA, from where the term EAI and its inclusiveness has (according to Prado and Skrobek) originated. Although in a statement on the CD made at IHM Miguel and Julien do not point the finger at any individual names, the main target would appear to be Jon Abbey, owner of Erstwhile Records and an outspoken, opinionated voice in online circles on improvised music and also on its division into two subgenres, “EAI” and “EFI”

The artwork shows two members of the Red Army, with one of them holding up a book of rules labelled EAI. On one hand the whole use of this imagery and in particular the title American Nightmare is a bit silly, schoolyard stuff. On the other hand though if someone of influence in online circles is to make firm statements about this music that they hold to be true then it is probably inevitable that there will be those that choose to stand against this. Miguel and Julien clearly do not like the way that certain ways of playing improvised music are held up to be more valid than others. Whilst in essence I agree with them I also think the argument is all over something that does not really exist outside of the small world of internet circles. While the rules for what music may be considered to be “EAI” (and thus implicitly not old or irrelevant “EFI”) do seem to have been developed in forums such as IHM, with Jon Abbey playing a major part, such criteria seems completely irrelevant to the musicians I see and hear making music. No one really seems to care what fits into which bracket, at least not in this country. So although I can sympathise to some degree with the sentiments behind American Nightmare I don’t think they were really worth making at such a microscopic level.

Miguel and Julien also mentioned that the music on American Nightmare is designed to stand in contrast to perceived ideas of “good taste” and that it rejects such ideas as “virtuosity”, “beauty” and the “perfection of timing.” These ideas, while maybe not in any way original are of much more interest to me than any question about the impact of online subgenre names on the music. The two tracks on American Nightmare are not so different from other recent Skrobek releases in that they often use “ugly” sounds that do not fit together well in any commonly recognised manner and are spaced apart by silences that can last up to ten seconds at a time. It would appear (I don’t know for certain) that the two musicians put the two tracks together at a distance, each recording their parts (Prado plays prepared cello on one track, prepared piano on the other while Skrobek uses a digital synthesiser) separately and the music then being pieced together by file exchange.

So what we get is a series of partially disconnected sounds arranged alongside each other, separated by awkward silences. Often the sounds are brutally truncated, cut short by digital silence, and often (mainly thanks to Skrobek’s synth it would seem) they appear strangely absurd, out of place when considered alongside the other sounds around them. These challenges to easy listening are common themes through Julien Skrobek’s music and are interesting elements to me. It isn’t possible to describe the music of American Nightmare as beautiful. It also isn’t possible to talk about timing, layering, gradual shifts of texture or any of the other standard terminology from the improvised music thesaurus that we (myself very much included) often fall back upon. The music does indeed stand as a challenge to the easy pigeon-holing of music into convenient categories. It also (ironically given the liner notes referencing of improvised music) appears to be a composed work, at least in some manner or another. That it isn’t quite possible to work out exactly how the music was made, and also because I am never quite certain how I am meant to enjoy the end “product” I find American Nightmare to be an intriguing release.

Yeah so someone on the cover is holding up an EAI rulebook. Get beyond this though and instead listen to the music and try and figure out a way to respond to it. The music itself, its awkwardness and refusal to give the listener any easy reference points is far more interesting than what is written on the sleeve. At the end, after the challenges of the music have been faced there is still the question of whether I find the music enjoyable to listen to or not. I guess I probably do, but I’m not so sure I would feel the same after repeated listens.
(Richard Pinnell)

Just Outside
I doubt it's necessary, at this point, to get into the combative aspects of this release again. Suffice it to say that while I have some general sympathies for the situation in which certain musicians find themselves (insofar as the dominant influence in this tiny corner of the world is one with which they have profound disagreements), my suggestion is to make their position evident via "better" music or, if that's dismissed as irrelevant or a implicit siding with the very hierarchical imperialism they're fighting, make the argument via words, either in conversation (as Mattin did with me a couple months back) or text.

Sometimes, that "better" music option is approximated, at least to my ears; I think I'm more amenable to much from these folks than many (am I still the only person who liked Mattin's "Songbook"?). I'm not so sanguine about the sounds on this one. Prado (prepared cello, prepared piano) and Skrobek (synthesizer) produce sparse, disjunctive sounds (done in real time, together? I don't know) that have a surface similarity to something like MIMEO's "sight" but, for me, lack that recording's extraordinary poetry-at-a-distance. In the back cover text, they lament music "upheld for aesthetic criteria only", but I think this betrays a shallow view of what "aesthetics" means for humans, relegating it to an artsy superficiality rather than fundamental fuel. Skrobek injects bubbly, annoying synth sounds quite often, presumably with an intentionality a la John White in "Treatise" performances but, for me, without a clear understanding of purpose, i.e., knowing that the text encompasses such readings, even if many of the performers don't realize it. Silly noises are fine, but when only done as a kind of nose-thumbing, wear thin.

But sure, I can hyper-aesthetize this recording as any other, and it scans ok, it sits back there puttering away pleasantly enough; track two works pretty well. I doubt that's what was intended, though. Skrobek's "Double Entendre" is a big favorite of mine so far this year. "American Nightmare" doesn't deliver the whack alongside my head that I imagine was desired.

I would have expected this to be available for free download--maybe I'm missing something but I don't see it. Otherwise, Why Not
(Brian Olewnick)

Paris Transatlantic
When this limited edition (ridiculously limited edition, like all of Goh Lee Kwang's Why Nots) CDR was released a month or two ago it provoked a teacup-size storm of protests from certain quarters, who were "offended" by its accompanying text (which I won't bother to quote, for I don't find it particularly provocative), but musically it's about as offensive as Music For Airports. Indeed, I'd argue that much of this post-Malfatti stuff – music where the silence to sound ratio is tilted heavily in favour of the former – is the new Ambient music. It works perfectly well in the background while you busy yourself with various sundry domestic tasks – the less noisy ones, that is: hoovering the apartment and using the spincycle on the washing machine aren't recommended if you want to catch all the delicate sprinkles and squiggles of prepared cello and piano (Prado) and synthesizer (Skrobek) – but it's also satisfying enough to sit down and give your full attention to. The sounding events, when they appear, are carefully constructed and beautifully paced across the album's two tracks, which last respectively 14'53" and 24'58". Forget the silly "politics", and just use your ears. There's much to enjoy.
(Dan Warburton)

00024 Jan-M. Iversen:: Con-spiration

Jan-M. Iversen:: Con-spiration
Release Date: November 2005

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00025 G.O.D.O.G.:: Square

G.O.D.O.G.:: Square
Release Date: March 2006

G.O.D.O.G. Pre-recorded Guitar, Laptop

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00026 Julien Skrobek:: Volatil

Julien Skrobek:: Volatil
Release Date: September 2008

Volatile 01 and 02,

Recorded on the island of Oléron, France during the summer 2008

Julien Skrobek: guitars, drum-machine, radio, field-recordings, sine waves

Speakers: Van Dung and Diep N'Guyen

realized with free software

from JS's email:
I used the picture of the bird because in French we have the adjective "volatil" which means "volatile" in English, but with a "e" in French it also means "winged creature" or bird, hence the picture of the bird... :-)

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00027: Patrick Farmer:: The Wandering Rhizome

Patrick Farmer:: The Wandering Rhizome
Release Date: January 2009

08.10.08 bass drum, large bamboo stern, four acoustic guitar pickups, microphone, milk fronther.

Recorded at home by Patrick Farmer. pigeonsoffholiday@gmail.com

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Review(s):
Vital Weekly, 663
From the world of improvised electro-acoustic music. I don't think I ever heard of The Wandering Rhizome, which is one Patrick Farmer. He plays here bass drum, large bamboo stem, four acoustic guitar pickups, microphone and milk frother. Quite a curious piece of electro acoustic sound emerges from the speakers, with occasional rattling sounds and what seems to be lots of lo-fi hiss sound. Lots of silence is built in this piece. But then sound gets sometimes picked up again, and the volume increases substantially. It hoovers that fine balance between almost silence and almost noise. Quite a nice piece of what I believe live action music for a few objects.
(Frans De Waard)

The Watchful Ear
...the Patrick Farmer piece called The Wandering Rhizome that I mentioned last night. I played it through almost three times today ( I say almost because the second play-through was interrupted five minutes before the end by my arrival at work) and I also played it once last night. So (if my command of mathematics still works when I’m this tired) thats near as damn it four close listens within twenty four hours and I still haven’t much of an idea how the music on the recording is made!

The sleeve note lists Patrick’s instrumentation as bass drum, large bamboo stem, four acoustic guitar pickups, microphone and milk frother. The music is really hard to describe, but I am taking a wild guess that Patrick has miked up the drum and the bamboo and then held the frother (which I am guessing is some kind of fast vibrating kitchen utensil?) against them to create a fast strumming sound not unlike that which Keith Rowe used to make by flicking a spring wedged between two guitar strings. There are many different variations on this sound though, as presumably the frother is applied to different objects, nearer or further away from one of the pickups, sometimes in momentary bursts, sometimes for longer. There are other sounds here too, dirty electronic sounding splurges and scuffs that give the whole recording a very lo-fi, Jeph Jerman styled sound, and some three quarters of the way into the twenty-seven minute disc all hell breaks out as the throbbing sounds coalesce into a rich swarm of vibrations. I’ve no idea how this bit was done, but certainly I don’t think there are any overdubs or post production work involved.

However its made this is a very clever, skilled piece of music that sounds very original and keeps the listener entertained throughout. Patrick is a great musician as well as an inspirational organising force among musicians in the UK right now. A duo of his percussion work alongside Dominic Lash’s bass will appear on Cathnor a bit later this year. He also appears on the one of the two new Compost and Height 3″ releases I have on my desk right now and will hopefully get to play tomorrow...
(Richard Pinnell)

00028 Alessandro Calbucci / Matteo Uggeri:: The Distance

Alessandro Calbucci / Matteo Uggeri:: The Distance
Release Date: October 2008

1 Lost
2 Under
3 There
4 Return

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Review(s)
VITAL WEEKLY, 649
I heard of Matteo Uggeri (field recordings, objects, mixing) but Alessandro Colbucci (guitar, loops, mixing) seems to be a new name for me. They recommend headphone listening, but I’m afraid that’s something I hardly do. The have four pieces here of drone related music. A swirling mass of electronics, processed guitar sounds, the scratching of the surface with contact microphones and street and rain sounds make up a very decent ambient drone releases. Atmospheric, dark, doomy and perhaps as such not a real innovative musical thing, but also as such quite some nice music. Which is of course good enough.
- Frans De Waard -

The Watchful Ear
..The Distance by the previously unknown to me duo of Alessandro Calbucci and Matteo Uggeri. Its a pleasant listen, looping acoustic drones take up most of the space in the music but the use of field recordings works well, even if they aren’t so original (the first thing we hear as the first track begins is the crackle of fireworks)...
Richard Pinnell

Kathodik
Strana coppia, quella formata da Alessandro Calbucci e Matteo Uggeri.
Il primo, noto come batterista invischiato in frenesie rumorose (From Hands, Sedia, Beasts), il secondo (Hue, Sparkle In Grey), eclettico sperimentatore gentile (fra i più noti ed attivi in Italia).
“The Distance”, non gioca nessuna carta mirabolante, non estrae conigli dal cilindro, e non si avventura lungo nessuna strada sconosciuta.
Semplice, per concezione e messa in pratica.
Strati sottili di field recordings, piccoli accartocciamenti di microfoni, serene linee di chitarra, orientaleggianti e dronate, che vanno.
Null'altro.
E forse, il suo limite, è proprio (nell'apparente) semplicità compositiva.
Per (in) un lavoro, che si pone (idealmente), come fondale di sviluppo attimi, di serena riflessione defaticante.
Quattro lunghe tracce, che, piuttosto che all'oggi, paiono guardare ad un minimalismo, storico e leggermente freak (acquitrini Popol Vuh, Nico alle prese con il deserto e Tony Conrad in fase di riavvicinamento terra...).
E questo è un bene.
Ambientazioni rilucenti e filmiche, che si aprono, offrono, e poi dimenticano.
Il sapore post, che lasciano sulla punta della lingua, possiede qualità (alle quali forse, non siamo più abituati...).
Senza ansia, senza pretese art/avant/impro e via dicendo.
Uno sguardo malinconico, dentro una vecchia cisterna, che la ruggine spacca e porge al sole.
Assolutamente distanti dalla perfezione, ma credo non fosse quello che cercavano.
Per vari motivi, pigrizia, lentezza, anche paura, ho rimandato il più possibile questo ascolto.
Sfortuna/fortuna, poiché, queste composizioni, grossa suggestione traggono dall'esposizione al terso cielo estivo.
Uno stato di quiete.
Semplice.
Marco Carcasi

00029 Birgit Ulher & Heddy Boubaker:: Upside Down

Birgit Ulher & Heddy Boubaker:: Upside Down
Release Date: June 2008

1. 2:53
2. 6:20
3. 2:36
4. 4:28
5. 12:06
6. 3:59
total time 32:39

all music by Boubaker/Ulher GEMA

Birgit Ulher (trumpet, radio, objects) Heddy Boubaker (alto saxophone)

Recorded in Hamburg on October 26 2007 by Birgit Ulher.
Mixed & mastered by Heddy Boubaker.

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Review(s):
Touching Extreme
Dialogues for trumpet, radio and objects (Ulher) and alto sax (Boubaker). Want sticky fluid materials, hisses, groans, micro-noises and oral stimulation of embouchures? No, you don’t need to surf the web in search of downloads about the sexual intercourse of African mammals. Upside Down represents the “dirtier” side of “silent” EAI – it’s not that silent, on a second thought – in which the amplification of the smallest details is what produces the acoustic substances that manage to snatch our interest. Apart from the classic choked pitches replete with upper partials that make your aural conduits feel damp by saliva droplets, Ulher and Boubaker seem interested to the generation of rhythmic patterns – albeit irregular – within the very structure of their emissions. Variations are introduced by the modification of amplitude that the blowing comrades produce by varying the opening of the mouth, making some of these tiny winds appear like if they were enhanced by a flanger. In the final track, the air gurgles and morphs its shapes inside a bucket of water. Not exactly shocking stuff nowadays, but this is definitely a legitimate paradigm of such a type of invasive instrumental investigation.
- Massimo Ricci -

Vital Weekly
The first release is a duo recording with Birgit Uhler, who plays trumpet, radio and objects. The six pieces were recorded in Hamburg in 2007. They play their instruments like objects like so many do these days. There is however one thing which makes them a bit different and that is the volume they use. In this area its not uncommon to play things at a soft level, but here the instruments are loud (well, relatively speaking) and clear. They play some intense pieces, exploring their instruments in unusual manner and making some intense listening. A very fine work that has the right length of thirty-two minutes, which requires your full concentration.
- Frans De Waard -

00030 Wolfgang Fuchs:: Brinx

Wolfgang Fuchs:: Brinx ~ 10 pieces for 1 turntable
Release Date: July 2007

01 Weber
02 Central
03 Durchwahl8
04 Steam
05 Omni
06 Arl
07 Stingl
08 Raffa
09 Ransone
10 Finncrisp

Recorded in Margareten/Vienna, 2005/2006

http://turntabling.firstfloor.org

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Review(s):
VITAL WEEKLY, 583
I never heard of Wolfgang Fuchs who on 'Brinx' offers us '10 pieces for 1 turntable'. Wrong connections are made and the turntable offers a lot of feedback, hiss and an occasional crackle of needle skipping - there even might be a record (as in a piece of vinyl) involved. However I must admit that these ten variations on a theme are quite nice indeed. A rather conceptual approach than a musical one, me thinks, but with enough variation to make things interesting.
(Frans De Waard)