============ VITAL WEEKLY ============ number 425 ------------ week 23 ------------ contents: BIOSPHERE - AUTOR DE LA LUNE (CD by Touch) KUSH ARORA - UNDERWATER JIHAD (CD by Record Label Records) OREN AMBARCHI - GRAPES FROM THE ESTATE (CD by Touch) STEPHAN WITTWER - SICHT 04 ETC. (2CD by Domizil) BURCH RENDERS & REDUCERS MAMA - THEATERMUSIK (CD by Domizil) SCHURER - VEXATIONS (CD by Domizil) DOMIZIL VS ANTIFROST LIVE (2CD by Domizil) COMPOSITIONS FOR GUITARS VOL. 2 (CD by A Bruit Secret) FABRICE EGLIN & JEROME NOETINGER - PSYCHOTIC REACTIONS & LIGHTNIN' RAG (CD by A Bruit Secret) EARTHMONKEY - AUDIOSAPIEN (CD by Beta-lactam Ring Records) EARTMONKEY - DRUM MACHINE (miniCD by Beta-lactam Ring Records) AIDAN BAKER - AN INTRICATE COURSE OF DECEPTION (CD by Angle Rec) GONE BALD - TEN YEAR ANNIVERSARY (CD by Gone Bald) IAN ANDREWS - CEREMONIAL (CDR by Fallt) TU M' - POP INVOLVED [VERSION 3.0] (CDR by Fallt) [SIC] - GORILLA MASKING TAPE (CDR by Piehead Records) NADJA - I HAVE TASTED THE FIRE INSIDE YOUR MOUTH (3"CDR by Deserted Factory) ARC/PHOLDE - EYES IN THE BACK OF OUR HEADS (CDR by Worthy Records) PHOLDE - RELATING TO THE ULTIMATE PURPOSE (CDR by Mystery Sea) TOMAS KORBER - MASS PRODUCTION (CDR by W/M.OR) DAVENPORT - FREE COUNTRY (CDR by Digitalis Industries) HINTERLANDT - THE POWER OF DEL TE (CDR by Grain Of Sound) ROBOT SPEAKER - PLASTIC TV CHANNEL NO.5 (CDR by BedroomBrain Records) GINTAS K & DDN - THE PULSE AND CLICK OF YOUR CYBERHEART IS MELODY TO MY ANALOGUE TO DIGITAL CONVERTER (CDR by Burning Emptiness) SOUND_00 - OCTOBER GIRL (CDR by Suizid Recordz) BIOSPHERE - AUTOR DE LA LUNE (CD by Touch) As a young man I had children versions of some of the Jules Verne books and one of them was the journey to the moon story. a beautiful hardcover book with original etchings as far as I remember. As a young man I liked learning about our solar system and the planets and so I liked this particular Verne story a lot, which is a true visionairy one (or maybe the later scientists were Verne readers and modelled the Apollo after Verne's design?). In any case, Radio France Culture asked Geir Jenssen, aka Biosphere, to use their archival source material to compose a piece and Geir choose the Verne story to set to music. The travel starts with a twenty some minute intro, that lifts you up and then the journey starts. It might be no surprise that this deep ambient with capital 'D' and capital 'A'. Very low end bass sounds and high end pitched sounds pushed to the back, this is the ideal music to listen on headphones at night, on you balcony, watching the stars. It's both the sound of a spacecraft aswell as the sound of weightless space. Ambient music is maybe not at a point anymore where really exciting new stuff happens, and in that respect the new Biosphere is no different, but Biosphere belongs to the very artists in the ambient music field who do a really good job - throughout. (FdW) Address: http://www.touchmusic.org.uk KUSH ARORA - UNDERWATER JIHAD (CD by Record Label Records) Only 22 years old, and already active in music since the age of 15, is Kush Arora from the San Francisco Bay Area. Originally as Involution, then as Clairaudience, and now a solo artist. I must say that I have no idea what an underwater jihad is. A holy war against sharks? Kush Arora calls his music 'bhangra-industrial crossovers', but, just as I don't know what an underwater jihad is, I have no much clue about bhangra music. The music on his CD is a blend of middle-eastern drum patterns, some sampled singing (also middle-eastern/Indian nature) with some electronic processing - let's say the western influence in this release. I think it's pretty skillfull made but for me personally it's not something I liked very much. Too often I had the idea of listening to Muslimgauze samples and I think the world do not need any Muslimgauze copycat, because he was the best copycat of his own work. The vaguely ethnic music that was otherwise part of the dish, could't interest me very much, nor the hip hop/techno music in some of the other areas. I think it's well-done, this release, but unfortunally failed to hold any of my attention. (FdW) Address: http://www.recordlabelrecords.org OREN AMBARCHI - GRAPES FROM THE ESTATE (CD by Touch) When Touch released the first Oren Ambarchi I was surprised to see the work of such an unknown man on such a well-known label, and to be honest, back then I wasn't that impressed with 'Insulation'. Things changed over the years a lot. Ambarchi is not a guy fooling around with guitar sounds and computer, but foremost he plays guitar and he improvises with others - countless CDs are the result. His second solo work for Touch, 'Suspension' was already a more personal album but now he takes matters to his own completely. The first piece is like Oren Ambarchi live: playing a few notes, lots of silence - or rather: space - between the notes and nothing else. But on 'Girl With The Silver Eyes' he add to a similar guitar playing also drums and hammond organ, however they are also very sparsely used, like a few small blocks here and there and not throughout. Unlike 'Remedios The Beauty', in which percussion, piano, strings (the only instruments played by others) play a more continous role in the music, and it almost becomes a lounge music piece, or maybe an one man Town & Country. And then the final movement takes us back down, just electric guitars again, but it seems that this is almost a sparser piece of music then the opening piece. A single note is played over and over again, but with various sustains (although these differences only work on a very small level. If you are still looking for a good introduction to the solo work of Ambarchi, here's one. Play this and then a lot of his work with others fall to place too. And currentely on tour again in Europe. No reason to miss out. (FdW) Address: http://www.touchmusic.org.uk STEPHAN WITTWER - SICHT 04 ETC. (2CD by Domizil) BURCH RENDERS & REDUCERS MAMA - THEATERMUSIK (CD by Domizil) SCHURER - VEXATIONS (CD by Domizil) DOMIZIL VS ANTIFROST LIVE (2CD by Domizil) Maybe the Swiss label Domizil hit upon a secret wallet: so many new releases at once. The first one is a double CD by Stephan Wittwer, whose 'Streams' CD (Vital Weekly 291) was his second solo CD in eleven years, but now it didn't take that long. Wittwer plays guitar, for what it's worth to know. In 'In A' there are guitar sounds, clearly recognizable, but there are mutated inside the computer. The ever so mysterious SuperCollider programm is responsible for these treatments. In other tracks, the guitar is only present because we are told so. Here the crackles of plug ins and ever changing algorhythms run amok. It's a pretty long one this CD and not always to access. Served in a smaller dose it is however quite nice. The second CD has only one track and is the opposite to the hectic first disc. It starts out with guitar plucking that is gradually being treated with computer techniques but half way through the piece the piece unfolds into drone music of a more heavy nature. Strictly personal I'd say that this is side of Wittwer that I liked better. The music of Burch Renders And Reducers Mama is of an entirely different nature. Apperentely these are twins who studied computer and electronic music, and played many concerts in hotel bars. In between they found time to compose music for theatre plays. Rather than lenghty pieces of music these are short songs, quirky popsongs. They work best when there is no singing in there. All the songs with vocals are sung by the original actors from the plays and they don't have the best voices. But once the material is instrumental, things are top. Imagine Sagor & Swing with the drums replaced by a rhythmbox and the hammondorgan replaced by cheap keyboards. But there is a certain sunny character throughout these songs that makes the listener very happy. At least that's what it did for me. Hard to say what these theatre plays are about, though. Not that I really care, the music is fine as it is. What exactely the 'Vexations' in Schurer's case are is not clear. 'Vexations' is a small piano piece by Erik Satie that had to repeated some 800plus times to get it's entire performance. Schurer, who sometimes operates as Teleform, offers twenty-eight small sketches of piano playing, but not just regular piano playing (just in some cases), but also computer processing of these sketches - well, or maybe other sketches, who knows. Sometimes Schurer touches upon the melancholy of Satie, such as in 'Compass3' (Schurer didn't use Satie's love of bizarre titles) and sometimes it removes the piano sound and soft crackles remain. Of course it's easy to compare this with Mitchell Akiyama's recent piano CD (see Vital Weekly 421) and the winner is Schurer. His delicate small playing wins the prize. Not really close to Satie's 'Vexations' but indeed a new counterpart to Satie indeed. The final new Domizil release is another double CD. In 2003 Coti K and Ilios from the Greek Antifrost label were travelling through Switzerland and they met Jason Kahn, Marcus Maeder, Bernd Schurer and Steinbrüchel. During various concerts in Switzerland they played solo concerts aswell as duets. This double CD has a disc of various solo outtakes and a disc of various collaborations. On the solo's CD Ilios' track is a standout in terms of upfront noise and Bernd Schurer is also on the noisy side but less upfront. The other four tracks all hoover round in the areas of microsounding crackles, deep bass tones and some high end peeps. Nice tracks for sure, as all four are main players on the scene, but maybe a bit too regular for my taste. In thah t respect I could more or less say the same about the duo's CD, but here the soft reputions of sound built up carefully and there is a little bit more tension around, probably due to the fact that the players are unfamiliar with eachother but each of the five pieces is a good quality laptop improvisation. (FdW) Address: http://www.domizil.ch COMPOSITIONS FOR GUITARS VOL. 2 (CD by A Bruit Secret) FABRICE EGLIN & JEROME NOETINGER - PSYCHOTIC REACTIONS & LIGHTNIN' RAG (CD by A Bruit Secret) In a way both of these new releases on the French improv label deal with guitars, but both from a different perspective. The first one is a compilation of four Japanese guitar players, each with his own specific playing of the guitar. The CD opens with Tetuzi Akiyama playing 'nylon string resonator guitars', which do not sound like a guitars, but rather like standing waves by Alvin Lucier. By contrast Toshimaru Nakamura's 'Gt Flo #2' is, despite being described as 'purely carved within feedbacks between and [sic] electric guitar, two guitar amps and three pickups', a calm piece of plucking an acoustic guitar. Just to be followed by the electric storm of Otomo Yoshihide's outburst in 'Plastics Pick & Mini Motor'. This man makes a hell of noise of his own, but when five of them pick up their electric guitars, things go very silent. Most odd. Taku Unami's piece concludes the CD with feedback arising from an acoustic guitar and a pedal steel guitar and is a nice one. Five contrasts for guitar. Diverse yet uniform in their radical approach of the guitar. The second is by guitar player Fabrice Eglin and electronics specialisty Jerome Noetinger, the latter probably more known than the first. Noetinger plays tape-recorder, feedback machines and pick-ups in such a way that I have rarely seen. Hectic, but somehow always on control. In this duet the guitar and the feedback meet up again, but unlike rock guitarists, guitar and feedback are seperated and played by two musicians, even when the two instruments used (guitar and reel-to-reel machine) are connected to eachother, as it would do in a rock situation. I hasten to say in a 'hard-rock' situation as at times these boys rock the house pretty loud. They put on a loud show, but before they do and just after that there is silence - inaudibility for several minutes. Thus they create a careful tension between noise and silence. An intense improvisation but also a rewarding one. (FdW) Address: http://www.abruitsecret.com EARTHMONKEY - AUDIOSAPIEN (CD by Beta-lactam Ring Records) EARTMONKEY - DRUM MACHINE (miniCD by Beta-lactam Ring Records) No doubt my mistake, but this is, I believe, my first encounter with Earthmonkey. I am told that this is the project by Peat Bog, who also plays on a couple Nurse With Wound records and I am led to believe that Steve Stapleton is also present on one of these releases, although I couldn't find any information on the cover. This is one of those releases that I played a lot of times, not because I particulary liked or disliked it, but because I found it so hard to form an opinion about it. The pieces on both the full length and the mini CD are lenghty jams around a central theme - usually a jarring rhythm machine that continues on end. On top a bunch of samples are placed, like a drunk opera singer under the shower and then a guitar plays endless spacey jams on his guitar and his collection of 100 foot pedals. Not the usual Vital Weekly dish, but there are moments when I was working and really could 'dig this shit', but on the other hand, there are also moments when I switched it off in total annoyance. But somehow the annoyance wasn't strong enough not to give it another try. Krautrockers with a love for Nurse With Wound jamming around with The Legendary Pink Dots should take notice. (FdW) Address: http://www.blrrecords.com AIDAN BAKER - AN INTRICATE COURSE OF DECEPTION (CD by Angle Rec) More and more Aidan Baker is as people like Jim O'Rourke, Merzbow, Hakan Lidbo, Frans de Waard... - they're everywhere!... Till now there's sure more than 15 hours of solo music from Aidan Baker and I've heard about 4 hours so far. This album is released by the small label Angle. It's made of 4 pieces, the first one being the longest with it's 25 minutes and it's a blissful drone ambience, extremely calm and kinda warm, like something from Windy & Carl. The common peaceful atmosphere goes on but also some gentle noises appear later, not disturbing at all but adding more intensity, and also the mood gets darker at the end. Aidan knows how to make good and interesting droney music, he's developing the sound with lots of patience, realizing the ideas in a very proper way and without much unnecessary improvising, 'cause this is still drone music and there's not much space there for typical improvisations, one should have an idea what to do. And Aidan knows what to do to keep it interesting even when the pieces are longer than 20 minutes. So it's not a surprise Drone Records have noticed this and he's releasing a 7" for them soon. Excellent. (BR) Address: http://www.angle-rec.net and http://listen.to/aidan GONE BALD - TEN YEAR ANNIVERSARY (CD by Gone Bald) Originally Gone Bald is from Zagreb, Croatia but ever since their start they are from Amsterdam. This year they exist for ten years which is celebrated with this compilation of a new Gone Bald track aswell as a host of other Dutch bands. Ten years old but somehow I missed out on them. Gone Bald plays energetic rock music with a lot of wind instruments, at least judging by the fifteen minute track on this CD. I believe the windinstruments are a new feature on this track and they are played by people from the Pink Noise Quartet. Other rocking bands here are Peach Pit, Mika and Makazoruki. Punk is never far away for them, but unfortunally for me it is. Most interesting were Living Ornaments with the electronica experiments (and more regular visitors to Vital Weekly) and Terrie Ex (of the one punkband I like, The Ex) and Andy Moor's guitar improvisation. It's to see that Gone Bald have such diverse friends, hopefully bringing the weirder stuff to a wider audience. I hope they have more succes than bringing rock music to me. (FdW) Address: http://www.gonebald.net IAN ANDREWS - CEREMONIAL (CDR by Fallt) TU M' - POP INVOLVED [VERSION 3.0] (CDR by Fallt) Fallt could have fooled me with their new releases: DVD cases with print work in matching colours on the cover aswell as on the sound carrier, yet I couldn't see that they were CDRs... Ian who, you may ask? He comes from Australia and produces music since 1981, as a member of The Loop Orchestra, but also under the name The Horse He's Sick. Andrew plays rhythmical music, long pulsating tracks. Of course no surprise for someone who is a member of The Loop Orchestra, but in his solo work he works completely electronic. In some of the tracks, like 'Gynoecium', 'Departure' or 'Jaffa', the influences of Chain Reaction or Vladislav Delay are apparent, but Andrews can get away with it. The more interesting pieces to be found here are 'Libidinal Day', with it's gamelan samples and 'Da', which has a strong modern classical/minimalist approach to it. Here Andrews moves away from the fairly traditional minimalist techno movement and puts his own, much stronger voice, on rhythmical and minimalist music. Changes are subtle in all of his tracks, and the capture the listener. And the opening sound of 'Working The Hole': is that a sample of Gilbert/Lewis' Dome project? This and otherwise a very nice release. It's been a while since I last heard some music by Tu M', the Italian duo of Rossano Polidoro and Emiliano Romanelli. Much of their previous releases were alright, but there was always something missing, or rather: not every track was as strong. Each of the works had hit or miss character. I can't say that has changed in the time that I didn't hear their music but the majority of the fourteen tracks found on this CDR is quite enjoyable. More than before Tu M' seem to take their inspiration from popmusic, with sliced up parts of guitar playing and it is processed with all the usual laptop technqiues. Also more than before the balance between these two different sources is much better. But as so many with Tu M' releases that I heard there are some very nice tracks in here, but also some that I think would have been left off, like 'Plum Cake' or 'What Time Is It?'. Maybe the release would have been too short, but it could have captured one's attention throughout. (FdW) Address: http://www.fallt.com [SIC] - GORILLA MASKING TAPE (CDR by Piehead Records) Although I don't remember this very well, I think I heard music by [sic] before, but I did I don't remember it now. Let's safely state that 'Gorilla Masking Tape' is my first real encounter with her music, for [sic] is one Jen Morris from Canada. Apperentely she uses such diverse sources as the Japanese koto and field recordings, but on both accounts she could have fooled me. In none of the six lenghty tracks I recognized much of any instrument, maybe safe for a wandering melody in 'Le Pukiste'. Mostly she transforms her sources into deep an dark ambient pieces and she does that rather well, although not much happens in this kind of music which is really new or adds much to what you may know about dark drone ambient music. After various releases on Piehead that were all in the category of 'breakbeat dance techno with a microsound twist', it's good to see that their 2004 series is moving in different directions too. Hopefully it will bring fans of the aforementioned shopping mall category to the bin where it says: 'pretty decent dark ambient drone and related music'. (FdW) Address: http://www.pieheadrecords.com NADJA - I HAVE TASTED THE FIRE INSIDE YOUR MOUTH (3"CDR by Deserted Factory) ARC/PHOLDE - EYES IN THE BACK OF OUR HEADS (CDR by Worthy Records) PHOLDE - RELATING TO THE ULTIMATE PURPOSE (CDR by Mystery Sea) Aidan Baker remains a busy bee. Last week we reviewed a solo release from him under his own name, and now it seems he also has a solo project under a different name: Nadja. It is explained to us that as Nadja he plays more 'heavy ambient music, combining 'swirling soundscapes with heavy guitar riffs and drums to create what might be termed drone-doom metal'. This 3" CDR is his second release as Nadja, following the full length 'Touched' from 2003. I must say I am not very impressed with 'I Have Tasted The Fire Inside Your Mouth'. The self-proclaimed qualifications are indeed rightly chosen: this might be 'drone-doom metal', but the twenty-one minutes are filled with a wall of guitar and drums sounds that hammer wildly around, but not necessarily go anywhere. I always thought this kind of music was called 'space-rock'. Baker is also a member of ARC, together with Richard Baker (not his brother, you might want to know). The third member, Christoph Kukiel, is not presented on this recording, but instead the two Baker's team up with Alan Bloor, who is sometimes Knurl and sometimes, like here, Pholde. As Pholde he plays amplified metal sheets and Aidan plays guitars, woodwinds, strings, percussion and Richard drums and percussion. Despite the input of three people playing percussion it's not really a percussive thing. It plays a role, but it's set admist this wall of ambient guitar playing and highly reverberated walls of metal sheet scraping. At times not to dissimilar to the Nadja release, and even when throughout the three tracks things go out of control, the collaborative structure of the piece is kept in mind, by all three. On a scale of 10, Nadja would be 5 and the Arc/Pholde collaboration 7. Pholde is also part of the slowly expanding imperium of Mystery Sea. Unlike others on Mystery Sea, Pholde plays seven tracks (as opposed to just a few very lenghty ones), but the strange thing is however that it's hard to see them as different tracks. The experience of the soft metal scraping, an occassional bang and tons of reverb is one lengthy track of highly underwater ambient. A deep sea soundtrack of a submarine with no windows, but still being able to swim forward. Small rocks are being hit against the submarine and fish swim by. Mystery Sea, a label devoted to the more fluid character of ambient music, have succeeded to add another fine example of the label philosophy to their catalogue. (FdW) Address: http://www.desertedfactory.com Address: http://www.worthyrecords.com Address: http://www.mysterysea.net TOMAS KORBER - MASS PRODUCTION (CDR by W/M.OR) Swiss guitarist Tomas Korber is one of the upcoming names in improvised, electronic music. He has done several collaborative works, such as with Steinbruchel and Gunter Muller, but slowly has more and more solo recordings. On this new CDR he plays, according to the cover, guitar and electronic devices. As far I'm concerned it could have listed 'anything + electronic devices', as this material sounds unlike a guitar and could be just any sound source being fed through electronic devices. I don't mean this as an critique, but as a compliment. Not that I hate the guitar but it's always nice to hear the guitar being used in a totally alienated way. And that's exactely what Korber does. In this single piece of three-quarters of an hour he shifts through a whole bunch of electronic textures, ranging from static hiss to the processed hum of motors on the guitar. Korber plays here a minimal card, that only occassionally leaps into noisy patterns, but for the bigger part is about ambient textures, although not necessarily appealling to the real ambient crowd. In his approach he sounds like a very early Jim O'Rourke and that's surely not the worst thing to be compared with. (FdW) Address: http://www.mattin.org DAVENPORT - FREE COUNTRY (CDR by Digitalis Industries) More from Digitalis Industries (see also last week). Free Country. What a great title. Is it about a country that is free? Or supposed to be free? Or is like Free Jazz, or Free Improv? Somehow I think it's more the latter than the first. This ten-people group (although for one reason or the other I don't think they play all at once) play different kinds of musics, but somehow the pieces fit to eachother. The title piece a drone rock piece and 'Hymn To Broken Neck Bone' is likewise but more minimal. 'Thou Shall Be Waking' sounds like a Current 93 going protest song, but it's very loosely played on guitars and fiddles. 'Taking On The Rails' is also loosely played, semi-improvised of violins, metallic percussion and guitars, but here no singing, but that happens again in 'Play It Once, Sam', also a song that isn't free from political connotations in the most free rocking setting on this CDR. Five tracks that are alike and different at the same time. For those who like Jackie O-Motherfucker and No Neck Blues Band a must-investigate and maybe a must-have. (FdW) Address: http://www.digitalisindustries.com HINTERLANDT - THE POWER OF DEL TE (CDR by Grain Of Sound) Jochen Gutsch, aka Hinterlandt, produces his follow-up to the well-received 'Poprekordt' release (see Vital Weekly 404). Well received by me, that is. I am not sure how well it in terms of sale, even when I would still recommend everyone to get a copy. That release was a fine blend of popmusic influences with the more electronic nature of microsound. I wouldn't say that this is a masterpiece that can't be better, but the new 'The Power Of Del Te' is a bit less. Gutsch takes sounds that are otherwise ignored, such as accidental noises. The grounds Gutsch walks here are more commonground microsound than 'Poprekordt'. I understand that 'The Power Of Del Te' is the counterpart of 'Poprekordt', but maybe it's more about the economical recycling of sounds that were left out of making 'Poprekordt'. It's nevertheless not a bad record at all: certain parts (like the opening sequence) are certainly worth, but the sequence following that is too regular microsounding of cracks and beeps. I'd say this is a nice introduction, but 'Poprekordt' is the thing to beat. (FdW) Address: http://www.grainofsound.com ROBOT SPEAKER - PLASTIC TV CHANNEL NO.5 (CDR by BedroomBrain Records) Music can be tiring and still be nice. Let me explain. Robot Speaker (aka Takuma Ebisawa, Tokyo, Japan) plays nice but tiring music. Twenty tracks in some forty-seven minutes, all with the same crazy sample madness. Lifting his sound elements from radio, TV, both music and spoken word, he chops it up in his sampler and combined with rhythmmachines and patterns, things get even more crazy. And tiring. This music is great, witty, short and to the point, but it should be a 3" CD(r) to maintain it's full power. Now tiredness leaps in and brings the album a bit. A very fucked up version of plunderphonica. (FdW) Address: http://www.bedroombrain.com GINTAS K & DDN - THE PULSE AND CLICK OF YOUR CYBERHEART IS MELODY TO MY ANALOGUE TO DIGITAL CONVERTER (CDR by Burning Emptiness) From the ever active Burning Emptiness, no longer dark underground techno, but maybe even a 'pop-label', more and more releases deal with collaborations between artists. Here Gintas K, from Lithuania and DDN, the men behind the labels, swapped sounds for over a year, which were 'remade and destroyed, sampled and resampled, cut and copypasted, mixed and edited'. Gintas K on his laptop full of software and DDN on guitar, theremin, synths and computer. The result is an odd mixture of semi-cosmic music, with arpeggio's from synths but at the same time some high-end software sound synthesis. Could sound like a drag, but it's not, and that has mainly to do with the fact that all tracks are shorter than two minutes and there is a great variety in approaches throughout this CDR. There is a funny cut-up style of analogue and digital means, which makes this into a very short but nevertheless long enough release. (FdW) Address: http://www.burningemptiness.fr.st SOUND_00 - OCTOBER GIRL (CDR by Suizid Recordz) Another droney release I'll review for this week's Vital is October Girl by my friend Sound_00 aka Toni Dimitrov. It's interesting to write about music made by people you hang out with. And since I don't make much music myself, it's sure great to know someone in my city or country makes this music. Sound_00 (who also runs Acid Fake Recordings) this time finds himself in a drone territory, conscious about that for the first time I guess (or perhaps not?), making a drone piece of 33 minutes. I'd say I'm positively surprised with how it sounds, it starts with few crackles and then distant lo-fi distorted sounds appear and they move on for 20 minutes, creating the main body of the piece (there's not much bass, except at the end). In the last 10 minutes other new sounds appear and that makes it interesting, though it might be more interesting if those or other new and different layers of sounds appeared more in the first half too... It would be great if this is a start of more thought-out and developed drone music to come. Let's see... (BR) Address: psychohead@t-online.de and www.acidfake.tk 1. From: jelle crama saturday 12 june at scheld'apen FREAKS END FUTURE / (K-RAA-K)3 festival AVARUS {fin} TOMUTONTTU {fin} CRANK STURGEON {usa} MAURO ANTONIO PAWLOWSKI {b} AF URSIN {b/fin} Antwerpen, Belgium http://www.kraak.net http://www.freaksendfuture.net 2. From: "lowfish@interlog.com" hello. Lowfish is playing live in London and Paris next week -- LONDON -Thursday June 3, 2004: Robot Music and Lo Recordings present: 'Lo-Bot Music' (flyer at http://www.lowfish.ca) Lowfish - Live (Suction Records/Ersatz Audio) - UK debut! Cursor Miner - Live (Lo Recordings/Uncharted Audio) Paul Blackford - Live (Breakin') plus Robot Music DJs and Lo Recordings Sound System @ The Key, Lazer Road, off York Way, Kings Cross, London. £7/door or £5 + 50p booking fee from www.delta9shop.com plus free cd: -- PARIS - Saturday June 5, 2004: goldrush présente: all kind of music au soleil de la butte 32 rue muller m°chateau rouge: 21h > DJs: ARK, HAGUFA and J-KELL Live: LOWFISH http://www.lowfish.ca 3. From: wojt3k kucharczyk HI FROM MIK.!. and just some upcoming precise mik.actions: it's time to dance! it's time to think! FELIX KUBIN & WOJT3K KUCHARCZYK "TERRITERRORTORIUM" (big premiere of VERSION RADIO FINAL) 4th june 00:05 [watch out -- it's the night from thursday to friday!] station : DEUTSCHLANDRADIO BERLIN the frequency differs all over germany, you can find it under http://www.d-radio.de, maybe outside of germany will be available too. please try to reach it. more details and official info: http://www.dradio.de/php_logic/beitrag_vorschau.php?programm=dlr=hoerspiel_dlr&id=262120 nextnext 6th june, sunday, 19 oo h, sztolnia "królowa luiza", zabrze/PL, ul. sienkiewicza 1, part of jaz festival: mik.musik.orgextra.!. meets realtime research project. (mik.!. this time with DEUCE, 8rolek & distorted animals)(realtime research with matthias mainz and boris polonski/cologne) LIVE solo shows and collective improvisations. nextnext 11th june, friday, 18 oo h, galeria kronika, bytom/PL, rynek 26: during opening of ANIA NALECKA's exhibition "gry i zabawy parami styczne, version 2.004" special performance "retro*sex*galaxy play" will be presented - r*s*g and ania will take a musical match... reminder - ANIA NALECKA designed mik.musik.!. basic www page. 4. From: zuton wie zutun »F u n k e n f l u g« 17.Juli.2004 Live: »W a p p e n b u n d« »E c h o W e s t« Villa Nachttanz Heidelberg Party auf zwei Floors Lagerfeuer Wegbschreibung unter http://www.elsola.de/ Reservierung unter info-funkenflug@web.de Privatveranstaltung Einlass begrenzt 5. From: tellab@xs4all.nl NOISE THEATRE (leave your laptop on your desktop) live; CRANK STURGEON MAYO-MAN SJAB-el-KEBAB wednesday 16th june co-9 zwolle thursday 17th june -de garage- the hague friday 18th june -planetart/sociale dienst-enschede 6. From: yoshio machida Exhibition I will participate to "2004 Japan Macedonia Exchange Exhibition of Contemporary Art." It will be held in 4th-14th, June in Bitola, Macedonia as the first stage. The second stage will be held in Japan in Autumn. See info: http://www.amorfon.com/~colavo Live Tour-Balkan/Europe/Japan Before and After the exhibition, I will play @ the following places. 2, Jun: Rhiz, Vienna, Austria Keiichi Sugimoto(minamo, fonica), Tetsuro Yasunaga(minamo, voima), Atsuhiro Ito, Yoshio Machida http://rhiz.org 5, Jun: The City Gallery, Bitola, Macedonia Keiichi Sugimoto(minamo, fonica), Tetsuro Yasunaga(minamo, voima), Atsuhiro Ito, Yoshio Machida, Foltin, etc. 6, Jun: The City Gallery, Bitola, Macedonia Keiichi Sugimoto(minamo, fonica), Tetsuro Yasunaga(minamo, voima), Atsuhiro Ito, Yoshio Machida, Foltin, etc. 19, Jun: Belgrade Botanical Garden, Belgrade, Serbia & Montenegro cinc, Yoshio Machida 19, Jun: REX, Belgrade, Serbia & Montenegro cinc, Yoshio Machida http://rex.b92.net/index.html 24, Jun: studio14 paradis, Paris, France miroque, my jazzy child, yoshio machida http://www.shoboshobo.com 26, Jun: Zakk, Bremen, Germany http://zakk.klubraum.org 28, Jun: tba, Amsterdam, The Netherlands Marko Ciciliani, Yoshio Machida, etc. TBA, Jul: Aoyama Book Center Roppongi, Tokyo, Japan Yoshio Machida 17, Jul: Grapefruit Moon, Tokyo, Japan pasadena, echo mountain, Yoshio Machida http://www.grapefruit-moon.com/ http://mao-jp.com 7. From: "Will Guthrie" JUNE 5 Peter JACQUEMYN solo + CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie Instants Chavires PARIS http://www.instantschavires.com/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------JUNE 6 CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie CUBA-CULTUR Munster GERMANY http://www.cuba-cultur.de/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------JUNE 7 CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie with Cor Fuhler Kraakgeluiden Overtoom 301 AMSTERDAM http://www.kraakgeluiden.tk/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ JUNE 8 CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie Le Crime Lille http://crimeasso.free.fr/ ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ JUNE 9 CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie Théâtre du Saulcy Université de Metz Ile du Saulcy à Metz FRANCE ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ JUNE 11 CRACKED AIR Jim Denley, Clayton Thomas, Will Guthrie L'an Vert Rue Mathieu Polain 4 Liege BELGIUM http://www.antboymusic.com 8. From: info@fotonrecords.com [FOtones 9.0] - aLOSTaSOULS crew in da house: tuk (live): welcomes us to the treasure island of haunted sounds, where guitars and electronics are our guides. 80000 (live): kwinten callens' solo project: found noises and electronic folk lead to uncomfortable soundscapes. dirk freenoise (live): an electric tennis racquet, a bad trumpeteer, toysynths and broken contactmics. moysk + wixel + man manly (live): noiseperformances by laurent 'veglia records' cartuyvels, vp broem and wim maesschalck. repetitive, hallucinogenic guitar layers and electronic beats grind along each other. trix (live): one half of ultranoise duo quintrix rocks the subs and twists the tweeters. lowdjo (dj): rising star in the belgian dj-scene, embracing everything that's electronic: from ambient to breakcore. mekithar garabedian (visuals): diaspora: what is language, when the voices that feed it are disappearing? leina bocar (video installation): using a high level of abstraction this american artist erases our cultural identity. when: thursday 03.06.2004 - 22:00 > this means back to our regular schedule! where: beursschouwburg, rue ortsstraat 20-28 - 1000 brussels - belgium free entrance. more info: http://www.fotonrecords.om/fotones and http://www.alostasouls.be/. -- Vital Weekly is published by Frans de Waard and submitted for free to anybody with an e-mail address. 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