Strut presents an all-time classic of South African music, the definitive remastered edition of Miriam Makeba’s ‘Pata Pata’, her first album recorded for Reprise in 1966.
[ September the 6th release from Not Applicable Recs: Lothar Ohlmeier, Rudi Ficherlehner, Isambard Khroustaliov – Hypertide Over Kiribati ]
“Describe in single words only the good things that come into your mind …”
The hypertide is real, so is Kiribati. In our collective somnambulism we’ve managed to create a situation where a low lying atoll in the Pacific will soon be flooded by the polar ice we’ve managed to melt in part by uploading photos to Instagram. A real life desert island paradise submereged by a virtual tide of holiday selfies.
[ September the 6th release from HUBRO – Frode Haltli – Border Woods ]
Norway Release: 06.09.2019
UK Release: 13.09.2019
Accordionist and composer Frode Haltli follows up last year’s acclaimed Hubro release, ‘Avant Folk’, with a smaller-scale yet equally inspired album that is built once again on the combination of traditional Nordic folk forms with influences drawn from world music and contemporary composition/improvisation.
[ 2019 Why Play Jazz – 30th of August release – (WPJ047) – Zwitschermaschine – System for Us ]
This debut album of Mark Weschenfelder’s Zwitschermachine has an especially independent character, as Krautrock, Psychedelic, Ambient, Groove and Post-M-Base shimmer through. But it remains unmistakably unique within the onrushing flow of musical events. You hear something strange, but as you listen, the music’s mystery becomes more and more accessible – that’s part of the enjoyment!
[ August the 30th release from Traumton: Matthias Boguth – Milk Wood ]
release on: 30th of August 2019
Such a debut is rare. Matthias Boguth, born in 1996, has been studying at the Leipzig University of Applied Sciences for three years and has already gained some stage experience as head of various bands and projects, but ahead of Milk Wood he released no album yet. All the more impressed now the depth and stringent variety of the production.
[August the 16th release from Origin Records: Ezra Weiss – We Limit Not the Truth of God]
Weiss’ debut Big Band album, due out August 16 on Origin Records.
“A bold, inspired figure in the contemporary jazz arranging scene.” – Josef Woodard, DownBeat
“Weiss proves himself to be a confident composer and arranger in the progressive mainstream.” – Nate Chinen, The New York Times
[ August the 9th release from ET’CETERA : To Paradise for Onions, Songs and Chamber Works of Edith Hemenway ]
EU release: 20th January 2019
US release: 9th August 2019
Today with have an exquisite rarity to offer to All Music devotees This is the first recording of the music of the American composer Edith Hemenway, who is 92 years young and lives in Providence, RI. Challenging sparkling and simply brilliant , for both: performers and listeners.
“Hemenway has the ability to create the spacious atmosphere of a landscape or the feelings of loneliness or loss in which the tone colour of the clarinet plays a special role. The care and love with which the CD is made is audible.” – Gerard Scheltens, Opus Klassiek
“Astonishment is a feeling that very well summarises the musical adventure of this CD…. Braithwaite succeeded here with flying colours and was able to bring together a truly star-studded cast for the recordings.” – Bram Faber, De Klarinet
“Edith Hemenway writes unexpected, expressionistic music. Her melodies are provocatively written not only for the voices but also for the instrumentalists…interesting and adventurous. Together with Roberta Alexander, (Claron) McFadden makes the Four Songs into a tour de force….heavenly!” – Michael Klier, Muziekwereld
Sam Britton aka. Isambard Khroustaliov – This Is My Private Beach, This Is My Jetsam (released on 19th of April 2019) Label: not applicable, 043 CD/DL
Latest project from Britton is both: fascinating and scary. What fascinates me is a three-dimensional vision and strong imaginary feeling of the soundscapes, which are always very perspective rich and taking as much from the music as they do from his formal training as an Architect. What scares is a feeling of an unavoidable catastrophe which had been already described in post-apocalyptic fiction.
It starts with Psychic Zero (here Britton revers to Ballard’s Terminal Beach novel with a subject being a Pacific Atoll in fictional post -nuclear future). He also refers to the sculpture called Empty Lot, by Mexican artist Abraham Cruzvillegas, touching the subject of an existentialism and hope. I remember this work presented in 2016 in Tate Modern’s Turbine Hall space. And that feeling of facing a situation of being hopeless. I believe that He must have built this idea on a similar sense of isolation which I experienced there, to the degree that I can still recall it in my head.
As we are leading now in the food chain, in this very moment, when species are disappearing from the planet due to our greediness and complete lack of common sense. It starts with a synthesised, Geiger counter like sound, splitting into partitions, dropping and rising, drilling channels inside the chambers of your head. Finally achieving some sense of the Harmony and pace which only nature can bring and set. Like a dance of simple bodies inside the oceanic abyss. But this Harmony is only one of the lines, when in the same sonic space, different amplitudes are breaking it with twisted, cold brutality and completely unexpected perspectives. Multiple imaginations are coming to your head, like sliding on some sharp unfriendly surface, or browsing frequencies, with nothing logical coming out but distortion. All of them keep adding to the sense of isolation.
Following Atoll Song, after over 23 minutes the apocalypse comes as a relief. Over looped choir of the single voice has something healing in its tissue. Maybe it is a sense of hope coming from the child’s timbre of the voice, maybe repetitive motive in a major key, or both.
But it breaks nicely through the depressive reality of the sonic landscape and gives you some trust in Natures Wisdom which is always going to find a way to survive, with Us, or without, more likely.
Closing this little Suite, an over 17-minute piece called Eb-Ub-Ob-Aa has more spacious character and almost humoristic aspect in its percussive samples coming into trivial, but charming melody patterns. With looped two tonal voice figures, balancing on the edge of onomatopoeic sounds and phrases with almost recognisable sounds and meanings, giving you a comforting feeling that everything going to come to the happy end, despite of all the mess. Finally, the hypnotic trip, coming into some understandable reality of words which you can finally quote, or even find some order in the sequences they are building up and the feel of awakening and resurfacing from the deep trans takes over.
As you can guess it is not easy listening music but for those who dare to submerge into it, a sweet reward will come. Sam’s trips on the other hand are never Lassie Come Home like anyway.
[ August the 8th release from HUBRO – Mats Eilertsen – Reveries and Revelations ]
Norwegian Release: 14.06.2019
UK release: 06.08.2019
Star bassist and HUBRO veteran Mats Eilertsen presents his innovative cut and paste solo project featuring cameos from a supergroup of guests including Arve Henriksen, Eivind Aarset, Geir Sundstøl, Thomas Strønen and Per Oddvar Johansen.
Ståle Storløkken – The Haze of Sleeplessness (released on 26h of April 2019) Label: Hubro CD2616
The latest Solo album from Ståle Storløkken, legendary Supersilent keyboardist is unique in many ways. First, it explores the Solo formula to the very bottom. Not is he only playing all the instruments on the set himself, but also mixes them, masters tracks and records them. This way he had has absolute control over the material on every production stage.
Second significance comes from the fact that all these instruments are pretty ancient, belonging to the 80’s period when Synth Pop and Electronica were both on the leading edge of Futurism. Now by making that specific choice he brings that all into the path of one-off Retro-Futurism, which alone makes a nice hyperbola.
Together with whats mentioned above, finally even the title puts you in sort of an on hold mental estate, holding the listener between dreams and awareness, somnambulist like state of being in which there is no strong border between the “real” and the “imagined”.
Seven-part Suite starts with Prelude to The Haze of Sleeplessness. That dreamy intro holds into some sort of floating feeling executed with sounds which are pretty humble and created in a simple, straightforward way that instruments are allowing. Looping them, mixing them if one has a different vision of that is a must then and explains why the total control over entire material he claimed is so necessary.
Following Orange Drops, more percussive in nature, with simple melody driving that reminds me Vangelis or Tangerine Dream Productions. Here humbleness of the instrument and sounds made when they are played also are adding to the tissue and this physical aspect also adds to the retro feeling.
Short Reality Box is just a 90 seconds interlude but serves a charm of the barrel organ played with the mechanical whacking weaved into subtle melody. Another one splitting the tissue in the same way is called Turbulance and it replicates the sound of the fabrics flapping in the wind.
Describing them all would steal the pleasure of discovering from the listener, so I won’t go any further with that. It must be said that all the pieces are sharing the same sense of inner journey, which makes the listener drifting with his own imagination. Just the same as such a music always supposed to do. Sort of personal soundtrack for the imaginary movie which don’t even have to exist at all in the real life. What makes it interesting is the fact that with a majority of sounds we are listening to today, sounds like those do not appear, simply due to their synthetic nature goes far beyond eclecticism available now without specific postproduction steps. Very interesting journey for everyone addicted to the history of synthesized music.