Flying Visit 2

Monique Orsini - Untitled (from Collection Resonance) (2011)

Another quick one to tide things over - I'm probably not going to get my last Bandcamp Friday roundup done before the next one comes around! No matter, that just gives me even more to talk about as and when. I've got a couple others in mind as well, I'm going to see if I can finish them up and schedule them out over this weekend. In the meantime, I've been drawing up a list for this upcoming (and final) BC Friday of this year. I don't think it's going to be as big as last times, but it is shaping up quite nicely.

I've been diving back into the archives and seeing if there's anything major I've missed - and n5MD makes up quite a significant chunk of that, they keep coming out with albums faster than I can pick them up! A great roster of artists and a fairly complete archive of their entire label on BC means that I have plenty to go at for a long time to come. I've gone way back to the very first thing I picked up from the label, before I really looked into them and saw that they were the current home of many of my favourite artists operating in the 'IDM' sphere. Light As A Feather is an album I found way back in the Grooveshark days. There are a few tracks that always stand out to me from it, and I'm surprised I haven't posted Resonance as of yet - it embodies the sound I think of when I remember this album, a unique kind of gritty yet airy IDM. This one in particular reminds me of some of Clark's work, albeit a little lighter on its feet than the sometimes grinding melodies of Clark.



Keeping things in an IDM style lane for now, with another cut from Touched Two, the massive charity compilation I've mentioned a few times now. I am still no closer to plumbing the entire depths of it's 200+ strong tracklist, but every time I come back with more gold. There's no shortage of big names on the comp, but I'd like to shine a light on Ochre - another discovery from my Grooveshark days, go figure. Ochre is the one who actually put this compilation on my radar way back when with Rowing to the Riverhead. The player on the original post is broken now, so I thought why not talk about it again here? A lovely meld of glitchy percussion and gorgeously smooth melodies, if you are at all a fan of IDN, you will find yourself in good company. My only complaint is the same one from that past post - I would have liked to have spent a little more time in this space.



And that'l be all for today, another short one I know - but I promise I will be back soon enough with more. After all, like I mentioned up top I owe you all a full breakdown of last month's Bandcamp scoops, and I will be adding even more to that come tomorrow! Until then, as always, stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF

In The Queue

Mel Bochner - Rules of Inference (1974)

Hey all, just another quick post with a rundown of things that are as the title says, in my queue. Starting with a fairly recent addition - the Celebrating Aphex Twin show on BBC Radio 6 (That link should let you listen, but you might have to be in the UK though and sign in/up, but you can see the tracklist in text on the page - and it'll only be available for 20 days as of this post as well!) from a few days ago was pretty great and managed to squeeze a decent amount of variety in there beyond just back-to-back AFX.

An early highlight is Warrington-Runcorn New Town Development Plan with Gateway To The North. If the album art didn't already tip you off, this is more in the vein of Boards Of Canada than it is AFX - replacing the tinges of Americana that BoC with a full-on British version. I have to admit, based on the title of the album and everything else, it does come across as trying a little too hard at first - the tunes themselves are great though. When Gateway To The North gets going around the 30 second mark it's lovely - while it is evocative of BoC it doesn't completely rip them off, there are echoes of Oneohtrix Point Never's early work in there as well with the analogue arpeggio making up the main body, a little like the Tron Legacy soundtrack as well now I think about it. Annoyingly, it's one of those bandcamp releases that doesn't let you preview all of the tracks, but if the rest of it is anything like this I'm sure I'll love it.



Speaking of previews, I decided to check in with Ocoeur again after bringing him up not too long ago - today we're talking the upcoming LP from him called Connections. It's always interesting to see which tracks get chosen as previews for an album, they can change wildly in sound from one track to another and that goes double for the kind of electronic that N5MD usually works with. From the two preview tracks on offer: Opposite Sides and title Connections, the experience seems to be a lot more delicate than the earlier albums I have in my collection.

A marked movement away from the glitchy electronics of Light As A Feather, though still with a hint of that roughness of those previous releases as well (most prominently on the title track Connections). But that's not a complaint from me - Ocoeur's melodies remain as beautiful as ever on both the sample offerings here. I've gone with Opposite Sides as my pick as it very much feels like an intro track (though according to the page it's actually the second). At the risk of repeating myself from the previous paragraph, if the rest of the album is at all like the small glimpse we've been given so far, I will very much like it.



And finally returning to something a little more local with a bit more from Ceiling Demons. It's been a while since the last time but they've returned with a new full length slated for a little later this year. Perks of the job mean I've had the privilege of hearing the full thing, but the rest of you'll have to wait until the full thing comes out on the 22nd. Snakes & Ladders makes a strong impression from the get go with the folky All Let Go heading things up, reminiscent of an old drinking song, complete with violin accompaniment. It's not long before returning to more familiar Hip Hop ground on track 2, Let The Currents Carry You Home. With a slight Jazzy feel that reminds me of Weekend World-era E-Z Rollers (albeit with a slower tempo) and it's catchy shout along chorus continue that strong impression.

I'd say it's an emotionally charged record, but then again truth is that all the Demons' releases so far have been - for Snakes & Ladders this comes to a boil on Freedom Fighting Dystopia (which is also our first hearing of Lee "Scratch" Perry(!) on this record - more on that later), stripped back to a lone guitar and some frankly cathartic delivery, culminating in the two accelerating to destruction in the final quarter - the vocals do a fantastic job keeping pace with the rising tempo until it's just not possible anymore too.

I could go on, but I best save it for A) When it actually comes out and B) When you can actually hear what I'm talking about as well. Couple final points before I leave it: there's a great Eastern influence (ironically) on the instrumentation of Dust Of The North and my favourite is the gentle treatment on the main Lee "Scratch" Perry feature and closing track Reprise Of Light. Until then though, here is one of the two previews From The Womb To The Grave.



One final note before I wrap up, Snakes & Ladders is on Bandcamp twice but with good reason: cheaper shipping rates on the physical releases if you're in the USA! The link for the USA Bandcamp page is here - and just for redundancy's sake the EU / UK one is here as well. And that'll do it for this round, time got away from me a little bit again, but you can pretty much expect future posts to kind of be on this schedule for a while - they might even become sparser in the coming weeks because things will be getting busier IRL. But until then, as always - stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF

Please Hold

The post in question I mentioned last time is taking a little longer than I want it to, but as I said last time I kind of expected that. Nothing major - just it's a very broad topic and I'm tackling it like a proper article instead of these usual quick-fire posts. I've been a little busier IRL too to boot. Still, that's why we plan for these things isn't it? And besides, I didn't want to do two fairly big posts back to back anyway.

Helen Frankenthaler - Robinson's Wrap (1974)
So I've got a little selection of things I'm eyeing to get my hands on soon, a fair warning we are heading back down IDM lane once again though - starting with Arovane, another find from my deep dive into the genre many years ago. My introduction delicate, almost ambient Tides, an album full of delicate electronics and for my money potentially the most accessible 'IDM' album of all time - there's no hyper-technological abrasiveness here, the tracks with beats come out sounding more closer to Trip Hop (particularly the kind of stuff Akira Yamaoka makes for the Silent Hill soundtracks), a great stepping stone if you're looking to get into the genre.

But my choice this time is actually from the follow up to that album with Lilies, a much more technological feeling album but no less organic on the melody front. Which is actually thematically relevant as there is a very strong Japanese influence on this album, first appearing on Passage To Nagoya, which features a sample of the Shinkansen announcer detailing the route to Shin-Ōsaka Station. My pick from the track list also shows this influence on the title, Cry Osaka Cry - by far and away the most conventionally 'IDM' of the lot, which is actually why I've chosen it this time. As long time readers will know I have a real soft spot for this style, it can be a little generic at times but I think Arovane skirts that nicely here, his melody work here is great and I just love that those delicate elements get their moment in the sun to stand alone in the final quarter. Lovely stuff.



Returning to early Apparat for more of the same vibe with his debut album: the delightfully german Multifunktionsebene. It was a bit difficult to find on streaming or otherwise legally on the web for a while, though unfortunately that's still the case for a few earlier Apparat releases like one of my favourites from him in the Shapemodes EP. Back on topic though, I do like it when there are little blurbs on Bandcamp pages about the albums in question, the one for Multifunktionsebene details the process behind the creation, which according to the bandcamp page is as follows:

at variable intervals, audio data are manipulated by using random modulation algorithms. the result is relaxed electronica, "de-beautified" by (severe) exceptional sound errors.

I'm not sure I 100% buy that, as someone who's worked with a similar kind of process before, that normally gets you some good bases that you then need to refine, but then again mine was for still images and not audio so maybe you can kind of stitch the good bits of randomness together easier in audio form. At any rate if there were a single track that would make me believe that it would be Multifocus, that squeaky synth making up the backbone of the track does seem pretty random in its excecution, and I will admit Apparat does a great job of contrasting it with some really smooth backing, pop it on some decent headphones and you can pick out the intricacies. While most of my favourite Apparat works are his later ones, I do have an appreciation for tracks like this, it's a striking debut at the very least, and Apparat builds on this foundation in really interesting ways in the releases afterwards.



Ocoeur to close out - I'm sure I say this every time I talk about them but they are yet another find from my Grooveshark days, one of the few recommended artists underneath The Flashbulb if I remember right. My introduction was Light As A Feather which is a fantastic album in its own right and an ideal intro to the man's work, it has an almost palpable textural feel to it that is on show in full force throughout that album. Truth be told though it's a little reductive to just label Ocoeur's output as just IDM - while it does fit under the broad umbrella of the term it doesn't give you a great idea as to what exactly it sounds like, which is one of the main reasons I don't much care for the 'IDM' name: Boards Of Canada and Aphex Twin are two wildly different atmospheres.

For example, there a lot of Techno influence when it comes to Ocoeur - not so much that the tracks come close to being full-on Techno mind you but it's certainly there, and I can think of no better example than the one I've chosen here. When it all comes together you get traces of the likes of Burial and Moderat too as First Highway breathes to life over the first couple of minutes. The sparse kick drums tease, coming in to full force around the 2:35 mark - underpinning the gentle weave of melodies and sounds that Ocoeur plays with over the rest of the runtime. I would still recommend Light As A Feather as a starting point, but if you like what you hear there then A Parallel Life will make a fine addition to it.



And that'll do it for this time. I don't have an exact ETA on when the bigger post I'm working on will be done, but I'll try to put a couple more of these smaller ones out in the meantime if it takes longer still. In the meantime I hope you find something in these selections that really appeals to you, I'd recommend Light As A Feather even if you're not into the genre, it's has some really great atmospheres on it and isn't too avant garde in its stylings, making it a much more digestible listen than you might expect given the IDM label. And with that, all that's left to say is - as always - stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF

Always Returning

Going to knock something out right quick for old times sake. I've taken a break from the IV of non-stop Hi-NRG and Eurobeat that brings me up to operational speed most days and swapped it from something a little more familiar. My love of techy glitchy things is well known by this point, but it's been a while since I had a whole post dedicated to it - so let's do that.

Grace Cossington Smith - Bed Time (1922)
I've said before one of the things I like about my recent Bandcamp scoops is that I get notified when new things from artists are coming out, gone are the days of me being surprised by a new album because I didn't check an artist's socials. It hasn't stopped to wishlist pile from getting larger and larger but it's something.

Enter Ocoeur, an artist who I found in almost a stereotypical way for me at this point: heard them on Grooveshark when that was still a thing and it just snowballed from there. This was during that time when I was sailing through the Warp Records catalog for anything and everything experimental and was always hungry for more. The downside for that was that I think a lot of the stuff I was listening to got lost in the undertow - like Light As A Feather for example. There's a couple of tracks from it that I've absolutely rinsed but coming back to it now it's almost like a completely new album. A track that has surprisingly not come up much for how often I re-start my shuffle from the top is 1.11 - a great distillation of the album as a whole. A typically lush juxtaposition of skittering beats and smooth synths, backed with the occasional intentional recording artifact. Perhaps a touch generic if you're very familiar with the genre, but I always have a soft spot for tracks like this.



Speaking of that era, one of the artists I also picked up in that time was The Flashbulb. His style is quite a bit different from the stuff you'd normally think of when it comes to the 'IDM' label. There's a lot more acoustic elements, particularly on this album - the beautifully bleak titled Soundtrack To A Vacant Life, though that's maybe not too removed from the genre given the Piano pieces on Aphex Twin's Drukqs. Anyway, the track I've chosen is part of the extended intro alongside the opening track Prelude.

Kirilian Voyager highlights some things I really like about The Flashbulb, I think his use of vocal samples like on the intro of this one is fantastic, it's from the movie 'Waking Life' which is equally fitting - though I can see it coming off as a bit trite nowadays (especially the later track on this album Suspended In A Sunbeam sampling Carl Sagan). The rest of the song is quite different from the Ocoeur one above, sporting an almost post-rock influence to the instrumentation with some little glitchy bits here and there for added flavour. The album as a whole is a really good introduction to The Flashbulb if you're new, though it is a little long at 31 tracks! I'd recommend listening to Warm Hands In Cold Fog and Submerged Renewed for both a more traditional IDM sound and a good cross section of the album too.



To round us out, one of the bigger names. One of my potentially most unpopular opinions when it comes to electronic music is about Autechre: I can't really get into any of their stuff after Tri Repetae. On paper I should at least like the album after that as well as it's really the last one before they went all in on the abstractness but I've yet to have it click (come back to this post in a couple years and see if that's changed!). That's not to say I don't at least admire their later work - they are absolute wizards when it comes to making what has now become their brand of experimental electronic, but it's not for me. In contrast, I think their first album Incunabula is an absolutely divine piece of that early 90's Warp sound, but I'm going to revisit their second album Amber today.

It's been a long time since I talked about Amber since the Warped History posts roundabout 10 years ago now, shy of re-posting one of my favourite ambient pieces from it Nine every so ofter, it's not come up too much. If ever there was a release that deftly avoided the 'difficult second album' trope - Amber may just be it. Released just one year after their debut, it sees the overall sound get much more refined and you can almost hear the signposts being laid of the eventual direction they would take into Tri Repetae and beyond. Despite the short gap between them it sounds quite far removed from the charmingly retro vibe of their debut, and as a whole sounds very, very modern for a release from 1994 - a trend that would continue for Autechre going forward.

Nil is one of my favourites from the album, and probably one of the more accessible Autechre tunes out there - it's much more melodic than their later work for certain, and in hindsight almost tame compared to even the follow up Tri Repetae. It creates a really great atmosphere though, well structured with peaks and valleys throughout - my favourite of which being the ambient break being pierced by those lush keys at around 3:30 or so.



The republishing quest continues - aside from a couple of unrecoverable posts it's been fairly smooth sailing. I'm trying to put up as much of it as I can but there are missing players here and there. Still, some of it has been pleasantly surprising in how easy it was too, and great little slices of history like us hyping up Madeon before he blew up. Good times. Right, that'll do it for this instalment, I might get another small one in before the Valentine's Mixtape hits but if I don't - I'll see you then!

And as always - stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF

Digital Digging

I've been looking through my Bandcamp collection and Wishlist in prep of the upcoming Friday, where they're continuing the tradition they've had recently of waiving their cut of the sales for that day. I've been taking advantage of this because it feels nice to do, and also it turns out having a set date to get music on actually makes me actually decide on things instead of throwing them in the pile of "to get to". Anyway, here are the results of that perusal.

Yiannis Tsaroychis - Cafe "Neon" At Night (1965)
I don't even have that much in my Bandcamp collection but already its easy for things to get a little lost, take The Flashbulb's Love As A Dark Hallway, I picked it up some time ago but then never really mentioned it here. I think the main reason for that is that it was an album I'd loved from afar for a couple of years by the time I got it, so while it was new it wasn't 'new' y'know? To cut a ramble short definitely check out The Flashbulb, Benn Jordan is a fantastic musician and his work under The Flashbulb moniker is often a lovely mix of ambient sensibilities and fairly accessible IDM. I'd almost argue it's easier to introduce folk to the genre with Flashbulb (although now I'm writing this, that's not counting the more melodic Aphex Twin pieces!), all the key elements are there just not as face melty as some others. Pastorial Whiskers almost sounds like it could be something from Squarepusher funnily enough, especially the Hello Everything era with those swooping synths and jazzy bass guitar work. One last side note I do like how Benn included different album art for each individual track for this album, it's a nice touch, a shame most music players don't support it fully though.



It's a similar tale with this next album actually, maybe even a longer one than the above. I first fell in with this one back on Grooveshark of all places, back when it would have been a new release in 2013. For all it's flaws I did really like its recommended system, it was better at showing you new stuff than Spotify at any rate which at least for me gets stuck in a loop of the same few albums and tracks, but I'm digressing again. It's been a while since I listened to it properly, the one album is very much lost in my usual MO of shuffling everything I own. Which is a shame because its a very slickly done slice of Ambient and IDM and is totally in line with that techy sounding vibe I've been after lately. There's definitely more than a bit of Burial influence on here and it sounds a lot like there's a touch of Moderat as well, especially the II album, they were only released a few months apart actually! It can get a little long in the tooth for me on some days, but as you might expect with my recent techy kick I'm very much into it today.



Third verse same as the first! I was a long time admirer of Soichi Terada's work on various soundtracks but his solo work was at that point either only on vinyl, out of print or just tricky to get hold of. Thankfully that's changed in recent times and a compilation of his various solo pieces is now easily grab-able on BC, Sounds From The Far East is essentially a 'best of' of Terada's House works, as much as I love his Drum & Bass from Ape Escape he has a real knack for the slower tempos too. Part of the reason I love Terada's work so much is that it sounds like he has so much fun when making them, something you can hear in the production and is reflected in the album art for this comp too. It's an unfortunate casualty of the digital version having a different tracklist curse, but it's not too hard to find the missing / replaced tracks out there if you're so inclined like I was. There are a ton of tracks I could pick but I went with one of my favourite deep house bits in Purple Haze which wastes no time getting into the swing of things, and is full of the hallmarks of Terada's sound of this era: sweeping synths, big kicks and bouncy basslines.



Something new (to me) to wrap up, once again making me further amend my "I don't like minimal" sign to say "I don't like a lot of minimal" (although this is technically tech house but the point stands if you give it a listen!) I checked out Swayzak based off the electro-poppy State Of Grace and I Dance Alone, and was greeted with this and similar tracks instead. I was surprised for sure, but then again this isn't the first time I've seen an artist make a dramatic 180 in sound. I've yet to take a proper dive in but I have found more than a few tracks to catch my ear that are once again scratching that techy itch I have. Low-Rez Skyline is fairly sedate which makes for really good at-the-computer music, there's a lot of little flourishes and switch ups throughout that keep things fresh and interesting for me. It echoes of one of my other favourite Tech/Deep House pieces: Marshall Jefferson's Mushrooms remixed by Salt City Orchestra, albeit minus the absolutely stellar spoken word element. If you asked me originally I'd say that Skyline could benefit from that type of treatment too, but now I'm not so sure. It's a little lengthy at almost 10 minutes, but that makes it one of the shorter tracks from this album, I could see that being a deal breaker for some and on paper I would include myself in that, but I'm only now beginning to feel it growing stale after my fourth or so listen in a row when prepping this post.



And that'll do us for today. Stay tuned this week as both mine and coincidentally the blog's birthday come up on Saturday, I don't know what if anything I'm gonna do yet but I hope to come up with something. There'll be certainly no party this year that's for sure. And on that note, as always, stay safe and enjoy the music.

-CVF