The Preservation label presents From Here To There, the debut album from San Francisco’s Ben Swire…

While From Here To There can sit snugly in the canon of electronica, it’s played out with expansive vision and immediate warmth. Woven together with a deft sense of minimalism and melody using double bass, interlocking guitars and crisp percussion, the use of live instrumentation against densely layered field recordings finds great balance between elasticity and deep ambient underpinnings.

The accomplished nature of From Here To There is the result of a diverse background working in music composition and sound engineering. Ben is a multi-instrumentalist who lived a spell in London, during which he came to collaborate on a single on the Ninja Tune label offshoot NTone with Riz Maslen, aka Neotropic. He also studied electronic music with noted electro-acoustic artist Charles Bestor, collaborated with experimentalists M Bentley and Joel Stern and has composed for film and new media.

After writing, performing and improvising with various groups, Ben pushed his focus further with production techniques to sow the seeds for From Here To There, his process clearly keeping an eye firmly on beautifully realised composition.

Ben is also a photographer, his work having been shown in several US galleries. His photos of desolate landscapes grace the artwork of the album to become a visual touchstone for the music’s epic sweep and sense of affected space.

Purchase soon from Experimedia here (10 % discount if you enter this code at checkout: 10forfluid)

Purchase from Boomkat here

www.preservation.com.au
www.foundrysite.com/benswire

We are pleased to announce Aaron Martin’s return to the Fluid mix instalments this Sunday evening at 7. Aaron’s first mix simply blew us away and I can safely say that this new selection is equally as good, if not better…

Track List:

Sergei Rachmaninov – Piano Trio No. 1 in G minor (The “Elegiac” Trio)
Johann Sebastian Bach – Cello Suite No. 5 in C minor: Prelude
Henry Purcell – With drooping wings ye Cupids come (from Act 3 of Dido and Aeneas)
Henryk Górecki – 3 Olden Style Pieces: I.
Steve Reich – Different Trains: After The War
Thai Elephant Orchestra – Phong’s Solo
Esmerine – Red Fire Farm
Dawn Smithson – Keep Breathing
Bruce Langhorne – Opening (from The Hired Hand)
Sibylle Baier – Tonight
Grand Salvo – Bend In The River
The Ivytree – The Book Of Job

About Aaron:

Aaron Martin began his musical life at age 11, switching between guitar and drums. At the age of 17, he decided to change paths and learn how to play the cello, which he went on to study in college. While earning his music degree, he began to experiment with recording.

After creating several self-released collections of music, and graduating college, he recorded Almond, which caught the attention of the Australian label Preservation, and became his debut release. He has gone on to record two more albums for Preservation, River Water and Chautauqua, as well as collaborating with a variety of other musicians, including Machinefabriek, Part Timer, and Tan or Boil, with releases on Type, mobeer, and Under the Spire Recordings.

Also make sure to check out our recent review of Aaron’s latest release ‘Worried About The Fire’ on the superb Experimedia label here

www.myspace.com/prisonwine

Very excited to be announcing an exclusive mix installment from the one and only Anthony Harrison aka Konntinent…

Konntinent – Sheep on the Downs

For my 33rd birthday I was bought a 1959 Grundig Cub reel to reel tape machine. Its in wonderful condition and was accompanied by a number of tape spools, originally used by the previous owner, Mr Ligget. Enamoured by the technology at his disposal, Mr Ligget spent a considerable amount of 1960 documenting the thoughts and activities of his family, their musical endeavours and their adventures in the garden. Sheep on the Downs is a 60 minute assembly of the Ligget families adventures, interspersed with some wonderful music of which I am certain they would approve. – Anthony

Track List:

1. Janek Schaefer: The Ruined City (excerpt)
2. The Caretaker: Lacunar Amnesia
3. Pascal Rogé: Gnossiennes No.1
4. Julie Doiron: Dirty Feet
5. M :17 Heures Parc Monceau
6. Solo Andata: Beneath this stone wall
7. Alva Noto: Haloid Xerrox copy 11
8. Atom TM: Weisses Rauschen (erster Teil)
9. Ezekiel Honig & Morgan Packard: A Lake of Suggestions pt.1
10. Remote Viewer: Spend more time with me
11. Le Lendemain: Linden
12. Mantovani: Colors Of My Life
13. Ass Chang: Hana (edit)
14. Konntinent: Of course I’m invincible
15. Arve Henriksen, Sorrow & its opposite

About the artist:

Konntinent is the work of London’s Antony J Harrison. As well as co-curating Phantom Channel (an esteemed Net/CD-R Label) including its special Events wing, Harrison’s recorded output can be found on revered labels including Symbolic Interaction, Dynamophone, Serein and Sonic Pieces.

His music is unique, utilising an arsenal of broken electronics, silky organic instrumentation, found sounds and drone-based soundscapes, Konntinent ensures he avoids well-trodden paths to establish the fact that his compositions are very much his own.

Also make sure to check out Anthony’s recent release ‘Opal Island’ on the fabulous Home Normal label here

www.myspace.com/konntinent
www.homenormal.com

Fluid Audio presents a wonderful free download release from the talented Maps and Diagrams…

Taking some time out from making music with Charles Sage as Hessien, Tim Martin brings his Maps and Diagrams project to the surface with four exclusive songs for Fluid Audio.

‘Cubiculo’ features a more structured, loop-based arrangement, drawing attention to a rounded and melodic stencil with focus on subtle, micro-crystalised rhythm, surrounded by a self-assurance and tangled textures with a salute towards the work of Oval and their deconstructed works of the 90’s.

‘Cubiculo’ creates a less-harsh listening environment compared to ‘The Giant Woods’ album on Yuki Yaki released in December 2009 and this is another steadfast release carefully crafted, interwoven with unfolding elements that makes Maps and Diagrams’ compositions so precisely enduring.

Available for free download from www.fluid-digital.co.uk in your choice of 320k mp3, FLAC, or just about any other format you could possibly desire.

Track List:

The Melancholy of the Weavers
Kopangyang
Gnomish Twang
Fragments of a Former Moon

All songs written and produced by Maps and Diagrams 2009/10.

Recorded at Roadmap Studios, Cambridgeshire.

All rights reserved Fluid Audio.
Copyright Handstitched 2010.

Artwork by Nikola

www.fluidaudio.co.uk
www.cactusisland.net
www.handstitched.net

Limited Second part to this amazing set exploring the ghostly echoes emanating from old Wagner recordings, slowly disintegrating into a haunted landscape of frayed tape loops and gradually exposed vapour trails of forgotten sounds and memories…

Following on from where its equally enigmatic predecessor left off, Plays Wagner Part 2 finds Pat Maherr returning with another volume of dark, phantasmagorical soundscapes. These somnolent, dreamlike passages bear all the hallmarks of that most overused of buzzwords: hauntology, and there’s little avoiding comparisons between Indignant Senility and one the movement’s best known affiliates – Leyland Kirby.

Plays Wagner is in a sense a 2nd generation hauntological work, arriving some time after the term was first ported from Derrida over to music journalism, and so whether it be by the artist’s implication or the listener’s inference there’s an unavoidable intertextuality evident in this music. In the crackling vinyl tracts of Philip Jeck, the evaporating tape reels of William Basinski and the haunted ballrooms brought to life by The Caretaker you can hear the virulent spread of a fictionalised brand of nostalgia, and Maherr’s work channels a similar language, exhuming dusty old Wagner recordings and exoosing eroded treatments of them onto cassette for a further degree of separation from the source.

The material at the heart of this record seems incredibly remote and spectral, residing somewhere within the muffled hum and warbling pitches of Maherr’s discolouring analogue equipment. By the time these sounds reach our ears, Wagner has long since gone and something very dark and elusive has taken his place. – Boomkat review

Purchase from Boomkat here
Purchase from Experimedia here (10 % discount if you enter this code at checkout: 10forfluid)

www.typerecords.com

The past couple of years have been good to Scott Tuma. After a five-year hiatus, “Not For Nobody” reminded everyone of the subtle force that was lurking up in Chicago.

He followed that up with an epic collaborative LP with Zelienople’s Mike Weis and an underrated gem as part of the Good Stuff House trio. Those ideas and manifestations present on all three albums come to a head with “Dandelion.”

This is Scott Tuma at his most definitive, most vocal, and most devastating. His acoustic vignettes flicker in and out like the specters of long forgotten greats, showing up just long enough to remind you that once upon a time, they ruled the land of kings. Sparse guitar plucks and banjo strums ache in the thin air. “Red Roses For Me” puts all the pieces in place with hollow, reverberating drones piercing the grey skies in the first half of the song. Quiet recordings of birdsong echo in the background, bouncing off minimally shifting banjo and chimes. But this is when Tuma really starts to mess with you, this is when “Dandelion” takes one of many unexpected turns. As a siren wails in the background, he is almost playful in the last half of the piece with a chord organ and gently strummed guitar bleeding nostalgia into the streets. It’s a sinister joke in the middle of the flood.

“Dandelion” is a a hymn to loves won, then lost. Dying on the vine, he bellows “You are so pretty,” yearning for something simpler and easier to navigate. “You’re always on my mind” reminds us that things come to an end, that even the best things have a shelflife. It runs head first into the megalith that is “Free Dirt.” Mike Weis makes his present felt as the duo navigates the darkest moments Tuma’s ever put to tape. This is “Taradiddle” drowned in the mud. Hope is lost to the darkness as denial turns to acceptance. Winding down into a wall of cymbals and heavy-handed acoustic guitar, it’s total catharsis. Tuma and Weis show again just how well they work together.

Eventually this ride, this testament comes to an end. The mournful longing of the final two pieces wraps “Dandelion” up into a perfect, graceful package. Scott Tuma shows one more time why there’s nobody else like him around. This may be an album that asks a lot of questions, but it answers every single one. – Digitalis

Side A:

1. San Luis Free
2. Old Woman
3. Red Roses For Me
4. Oakum
5. Again and Again
6. Hope Jones (jason’s song)

Side B:

1. Free Dirt
2. True History
3. The Roses are Red.

Purchase from Digitalis here
Purchase from Experimedia here
10 % discount if you enter this code at checkout: 10forfluid

www.myspace.com/scotttuma
www.digitalisindustries.com

Jannick Schou has certainly been a busy boy of late, and his most recent project is yet another confirmation that here we have an artist that is set for big things in 2010 and beyond…

I’ve always had a thing for tapes, and during the last couple of years I’ve frequently recorded small ambient/drone pieces using tapes as the main recording media. By now I’ve gathered a pretty substantial amount of “tape-drone-tracks”, so I thought I’d release some of them (for your possible pleasure). Eerie, noisey, melancholic and uplifting! Everything and nothing at the same time.

This “album” was not in any way meant to be a fully fleshed out project, but it turned out remarkably coherent. Initially, it lasted around 4 hours, so i’ve had to cut out some tracks. These 11 pieces are the ones I felt fitted well together. Take a listen. You might like it – in that case, great! If not, well, be glad you didn’t waste any money on it. Should you like it, please spread the word.

Thanks! – Jannick

Download here

Grab a ticket quick time for what is going to be one serious gig at Cafe OTO presenting Svarte Greiner, William Fowler Collins and Simon Scott alongside Home Normal Dj’s Ian Hawgood and Konntinent…

SUNDAY 14th March 2010

Svarte Greiner -

Type signed, Miasmah owning, Deaf Center creating, horror doom drone Nord overlord Erik K. Skodvin plays a rare London show
www.myspace.com/svartegreiner

Simon Scott -

Miasmah signed Navigare composer, Keshhhh curator former slowdive man returns to the capital
www.myspace.com/o3o3o

William Fowler Collins -

Brought to us by the mighty Type Records via New Mexico, William Fowler Collins first and only London show
www.myspace.com/williamfowlercollins

HomeNormal DJ’s -

Ian Hawgood
www.myspace.com/iandhawgood

Konntinent
www.myspace.com/konntinent

Tickets can be purchased here

www.cafeoto.co.uk
www.homenormal.com

The Oceans of Your Aura was composed in June of 2008 and was the culmination of musical breakthroughs, personal transcendence through dark times and a whole range of esoteric information that had guided me to that point in my life.

Each ’song’ in the album was created using two instances of pianoteq, a physical modeling software that here replicates two pianos each 10 meters in length, each having a unique tuning system always tuned one hertz from the other with A being 444 and 445 respectively. Both pianos also allow their strings to vibrate freely through the use of a constantly activated damper pedal. Loops of midi data drive these pianos through an improvisation that I carefully crafted into slow motion portraits of quasi-song structures.

Unlike much of my work which I arrive at in a very nonlinear way, The Oceans of Your Aura was through composed. Each track followed the other as a sort of vector towards personal growth. The track titles explore the emotional or psychic states under which each was created. Often, like many of my titles, they refer both to personal anecdotes and esoteric information that is often a source of creativity and inspiration for me. Here, we see an alchemical progression from the circumambulating golden flower in the first movement the final state of meditative contemplation of the final movement.

On another level, The Oceans of Your Aura are a collection of ambient love songs. They take the listener through a progression of emotions that describe the stages of moving away from and letting go of love and replacing it with spiritual love. – Slow Flow

[Limited to 100 copies only]

Coming soon to Slow Flow Records here
Coming soon to Experimedia store here

www.myspace.com/barelyaudible
www.slowflowrec.web.fc2.com
www.slowflowstore.bigcartel.com

Mathias Vaneecloo is a versatile creator who encompasses music, photography and art. Monolyth & Cobalt is his musical project and thanks to Simons Scott’s rather awesome KESH record label we are presented with the album “Rives,” a compilation of two previously self-released cdr’s.

This album in many ways personifies its creator with varying textures applied across the album’s 12 tracks. Opening with the ominous yet dreamy “Harmonium Melodies” and the haunting echoes of “The Sleepy Snow,” lucid sounds on “Road (movie)” and “June and June” bring the listener into an attentive state.

“Road (movie)” reminds me of those early days of spring, when the sun is higher in the sky. The warm, scattering of digital sounds provoke images of a bright light shimmering through the gaps of a venetian blind. “June and June” continues this theme recalling the sounds of Taylor Deupree and Christopher Willits.

Mathias achieves this contrasting sound through his exploitation of multiple acoustic instruments. “Rives” sees him play with the Harmonium, Piano, a variety of strings, melodica and he also records some vocal effects. Combining these natural sounds with a range of electronic techniques allows the album to tick many genre boxes spanning the drone and ambient sounds synonymous with other KESH recordings but also expanding to more unusual fusions as heard on tracks like “Whatever You Think Will Die” and “Three Walks.”

In conclusion this is a record that’s full of detailed, strong recordings. It is one that likes to surprise its audience such is the ever fluctuating nature of music on display here. Embodying the versatility of its architect, “Rives” is the product of a talented artist who likes to adapt to different mediums and is one to watch out for going forward. – Review by Josh Atkin

About the release:

Kesh are very pleased to release ‘Rives’, a compilation from the first two Monolyth & Cobalt self-released cdr’s. Recorded between 2007 &; 2009 Monolyth &; Cobalt is a music project from Mathias Vaneecloo, a french musician, photographer, plastic artist and performer born in 1977.

Mathias works with many acoustic instruments like Harmonium, Piano, Various Strings, melodica and some human sound such as breath on tape. He also uses modern technology inclusing samplers, sequencer & effects processors but his cinematic soundscapes never lose their organic feel and human emotion.

All of his music works are released like some book chapters, and the allbum is like a book or like a soundtrack for imaginary landscapes bringing to mind the film work of Tarkovski, David Lynch, Kubrik and Hitchcock.

His music oscillates between electro-acoustic, electronica, drone, ambient, minimalist or shoegaze. Comparisons are Deaf Centre, Slowdive, Biosphere and 12k’s Taylor deupree’s warmer moments although dig a little deeper and Debussy, Pierre Henry and John Cage can be heard as strong influences.

There are no borders to focus his feelings in sounds, he works in this way that escapes any musical limitations which crosses musical genres and evokes images of the past and the future combined with his compositions.

Stand out tracks include the ghostly echos of “The Sleeping Snow”, eerie opener “Harmonium melodies” and the warm digital tones of “June and june”.

The Sleeping Snow

Track List:

1.Harmonium Melodies
2.The Sleeping Snow
3.Road (movie)
4.Stormy Weather
5.Domaine Non-Identifie
6.JUNE AND JUNE
7.Whatever you think you will die
8.Rivages
9.Three Walks
10.Silence
11.Religious Lights
12.Guerre Friode

Release date 01.03.10

For more information contact KESH: sscochaa@ntlworld.com

www.keshhhhhh.com
www.myspace.com/monolythcobalt