Snow / Nostalgia for fellow children of the 1990s

The best way for a child of the 1990s to celebrate the modestly berserk levels of snow, which made the lake near my town look significantly more like a Grouper album cover...

Foundcloud #4

Another month, another Foundcloud. Accompanied this time by a link to my new Mute Branches EP -- Conditions in Limbo. I take a lot of inspiration from the music I cover on this blog so, if you enjoy that, please don't hesitate to stream or download free on the Bandcamp page.


El Fog - 'Time, Memory'

I only recently heard about El Fog, the vibraphone / electro-acoustic music project of Berlin-based artist Masayoshi Fujita. It’s fair to say that the concept of music containing vibraphones, elements of glitch and of general electro-acoustic tinkering (not to mention a release with Flau Records) was enough to send me rushing to his Soundcloud page like a cheetah on cocaine.

The track is a minimalist yet emotive vibraphone solo played over a similarly sparse field recording. Gradually, Fujita introduces gradually elements of electronic distortion that eventually come to take over the track. Like many of the tracks I speak highly of on this blog, it’s an excellent fusion of human instrumentalism and machine music that seems to say that, if – as so many annoying purists are wont to proclaim – electronics and computers are destroying music, then at least it’s a destruction that sounds good.

Honey Son - 'Soundprov #2'

This next track is a great live improvisation by Honey Son, the recording project of Texas-based Mars Wright.

Despite being a simple "one-man and a looper" set-up, Wright nevertheless keeps the track sounding fresh and interesting throughout. Beginning with interlocking guitar loops and the subsequent introduction of an additional phrase of e-bow guitar, the track continues to develop nicely - at one point resembling somewhat the jazz-inflected post-rock of a band like Tortoise, before increased improvisation with sampling and effects - as well as the introduction of soulful, somewhat Jeff Buckley-esque vocals - gives Wright the chance to take the track down a multitude of increasingly interesting musical avenues.

In a way, this solo, loop-based composition can be seen to - like the El Fog track - showcase just how much electronics have to offer to the realms of live instrumentation and performance.


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Additional notice deserves to be given to the unexpected Four Tet release - 0181 - consisting of unreleased music from between 1997 and 2001.



Click here to read the review I wrote of it for BeardRock.com.

YouTube Recommendation: Beach House - New Year

What better way to usher in the new year than with a song with the title 'New Year' that just so happens to be one of my personal favourite songs from one of my personal favourite albums of the year?

Its accompanying video, I guess -- released today by the band as a "happy new year" message to their fans.

As for the video itself, it's a mish-mash of footage, amongst which is included: footage from the recording of the album, some stunning outdoor shots and time-lapse footage (of the sort one can easily associate with Beach House's increasingly beautiful and dreamy music), and - probably the Internet's favourite visual subject* - cats.

Happy new year to you all! Hopefully I'll update this more frequently through 2013, and realise some of the (perhaps slightly overambitious) plans I have both for this blog and for other things.

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* That's suitable for the whole family, anyway.