Fringes Distribuzioni News.

3/4HadBeenEliminated (Valerio Tricoli, Stefano Pilia, Claudio Rocchetti)
Live at A+M Bookstore / Fringes Recordings
Via Tadino 30, Milano
9PM Sharp
5,00 euro

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Albert Ayler Boxset : I will have a few copies of the amazing Ayler boxset (Holy Ghost)
just released by Revenant records (9 cds, Book, memorabilia, all packaged in a beautiful box)
available for 110,00 euros plus shipping.
Please reserve your copy of you are interested.  They should be  in stock in 10 days.
More info at http://www.revenantrecords.com/

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Anomalous Records (US) :

Ellen Fullman “Staggered Stasis” [cd] “Staggered Stasis” (1989) was commissioned by the Deborah Hay Dance Company for part 1, “The Navigator” in Hay’s trilogy, “The Man Who Grew Common In Wisdom”. Microtonal shifts in the coloring occur in a staggered fashion, traveling on an axis of Pythagorean intervals, (the circle of fifths). Chords created by stacking 3/2s, or fifths, are referred to as “suspended chords”. There is a flatness in this drama, what I imagine it must be like in the middle of an ocean, continually moving yet appearing the same. The four part score was plotted on a timeline. Each track was recorded and performed by myself. An excerpt of Staggered Stasis was released on the Arial CD series.
“Duration” (1986) was composed as a 13-limit study for the Long String Instrument, in the key of C. The fundamental tone is continually sounded, under chords constructed with pitches from the overtone series. The intention of the piece was to listen to the variations within each chord, as it is sounded continually while the performer walked the length of the instrument. As the performer’s position changes, one clearly hears a cascade of overtones. “Duration” was never previously released.
The original recordings were made direct to a PCM digital processor using a vintage AKG C24 stereo tube condenser microphone placed about 15 feet from the resonators. For more information about Ellen Fullman, see: www.ellenfullman.com
Euro 17,00

Catsup Plate (US) :

The Ivytree “Winged Leaves” [cd] Glenn Donaldson plays in a whole slew of phenomenal bands — the Skygreen Leopards, the Blithe Sons, Thuja, the Franciscan Hobbies and about a half-dozen others — releasing them on Jewelled Antler, the label he co-founded, and numerous others. His vast and engaging creative output covers everything from field recordings and found sounds to plaintive pop to wide-eyed, drooling psychedelia and remains engaging and compelling. But to these ears, his most affecting work comes from the so-called “-tree” recordings, credited to either The Birdtree or The Ivytree (there have been compilation tracks credited to the Olivetree and one can imagine other potential -tree names are in the works), which take all these threads and knit them together into a expressive and focused whole.
Winged Leaves, the Ivytree follow-up to the 2003’s Orchards & Caravans(credited to The Birdtree — stay with me here), again finds Donaldson brewing a potent and unique style of acid folk balanced with incidental and instrumental pieces that focus on field recordings and less traditionally structured pieces. The songs here are based on guitar and voice improvisations and fleshed out with layers of bowed bouzouki, banjo, and dulcimer, along with organ and percussion. There is a distant melancholy in these songs, a mournfulness that somehow manages to be stately and tuneful in the rumble of sounds passing by. Donaldson’s voice accounts for much of this: his echoing, wordless (or, at the very least, indecipherable) falsetto cuts through the layers, like the summer sun poking through a dark canopy of leaves above.
But what’s really at the heart of Winged Leaves is space — the warmth and ambience of the places where Donaldson actually sat down to capture these songs and sounds. When not recording at his house, Donaldson recorded much of Winged Leaves outside in places like Big Sur and the Marin Headlands using acoustic or battery powered instruments. Much has been made of these unorthodox recording techniques and though they are easy to dismiss, the natural sounds (birds, the rushing of wind and creaking of branches) add a depth and sense of
presence that underscores the powerful emotions at work here. The almost limitless options of the recording studio would strip these fragile songs bare, but the natural ambience of a sea cliff in Marin adds an intensity that would otherwise be totally uncapturable.
Edition of 1000 copies in hand assembled, letterpressed chipboard digipaks, with full color tipped-on cover image and poster insert of Donaldson’s dizzying collage work.
Euro 15,50

Errant Bodies Press (US) :

Brandon LaBelle “Site Specific Sound” [Book+Cd] Site Specific Sound documents a series of sound installations from 1998 to 2002 by sound-artist and writer Brandon LaBelle. Each installation was created as part of the Beyond Music Sound Festival in Los Angeles, an annual festival on sound practice at Beyond Baroque Literary/Arts Center. Functioning site-specifically, and drawing upon the architectural structure of the building, the installations explore the relationship between sound and space by staging social and spatial interventions. In documenting these five installations over the course of five years Site Specific Sound pries open architecture, and the specifics of locality, as a contingent form whose relationship to sound extends well beyond acoustical phenomena. It suggests ways to understand the fabrication of space through sound as a central lens, and architecture itself as a strategy for the construction of sound events. Including writings by LaBelle, an interview by the Frankfurt-based media-artist Achim Wollscheid, and a Compact Disc of audio work.
Euro 20,00

Fringes (Italy) :

David Coulter / Michael Gira / Jean Marie Mathoul / Charlemagne Palestine
“Gantse Mishpuchah – Music in Three Parts” [cd] David Coulter (double bass, didjeridu, piano, percussion, violectra & voice), Michael Gira (Swans, Angels of Light on Akai S-900, finger & various sounds from Body Lovers, Jean Marie Mathoul (48Cameras, on Korg 05R/W, loops, percussion, samples & tapes), Charlemagne Palestine (alumonium, street recordings, Yamaha organ & voice).
Three long pieces of intense electro-acoustic drones. Part one, 22 minutes long has Tony Conrad (long string drone), Terry Edwards (trumpet), Bob Feldman (percussion), Deborah Glaser (percussion & voice), Chris Long (harmonium) and Jean-Jacques Palix (electronica) as guests ! 1000 copies in jewel box.
Euro 14,00

Alvin Curran “Canti Illuminati” [cd] “This re-edition of Canti Illuminati, 25 years after it’s appearance as my 3rd LP, is indeed a pleasure, and as one can imagine occasions a welcome moment of reflection: In the 70’s when downtown musical-america fully embraced delirious repetition, the key of C, asymmetrical beats, unison everything, performance art, innocent melodies, phase shifting, long delays, fedback loops, wierd instruments, ambient sounds, body art, story telling, emotion and progressive politics; not to mention audiences seated or lying on the floor listening to compositions and improvisations lasting up to 2 hours or more, we all knew we were in for trouble. New York City then was a centrifuge of incredible activity where composers, dancers, authors, performers, electronic engineers and arts administrators engaged in a feverish search for a new art-music accessible to anyone – a utopian trans-national people’s music, that reflected above all the elementary and irresistable unifying powers of the great traditional and classical musics from around the world, europe included.
The music of this period and place, never a formal movement, was anchored both aesthetically and philosophically in the vital secrets of minimalism, in the sounds of the environment, however unassuming or flawed, in the cyclical generation of tones and voltage controlled substances, solo voice, and the whole body as solo performer, in men and women as equals, in stories of ordinary people, in gestures of eloquent simplicity as well as open spirituality, in irony as well as transcendental yearning. Improvisation and composition were reconciled as children of the same parents and immaculate mathematical structures could easily cohabit under the same roof with chance . Instrumental virtuosity and implaccable drones were augmented to their human limits. And Rock music and musique concrete both contributed new values to amplification beat and noise. Lofts, garages, storefronts, art-galleries and living rooms along with malls, rivers, ports and other improbable spaces became the new concert halls, and the idolized “musica da camera” of the establishment aristocrats now became exquisitely egalitarian in its pulsing walls of sound, delicate melodies, well-tuned drones and contrapuntal loops. Cage’s fatherly shadow was everpresent, but his call for monastic rigor in this ebullient moment went largely unheeded. In Europe, the feared attack of the young American hordes on the bastions of Western music were way over-rated, and while Darmstadt and IRCAM continued on their ossified missions, the New-Downtowners began captivating large audiences everywhere under the aegis of a new generation of concert producers . Whether it was Laurie Anderson, Lamonte Young or Anthony Braxton, the musical offering was of an imagination, execution and listening experience perhaps as revolutionary as Schoenberg’s brilliant but unpopular attempt to liberate the musical tones from their natural tendencies some 60 years earlier. The significant difference here is that the Downtown music was hip, it swung and was in completely tune with the musical currents- both experimental and popular from everywhere. It was its own cultural Zeitgiest or at least the locomotive the Zeitgeist piloted.
As seen from the centers of power, the contamination of the high culture by these apparent primitive musical techniques and disloyal tendencies, simply appeared as a territorial threat; in reality it was a blessing, ne a tonal-blessing, and happily for all, nobody got hurt in the mix; we’re still trying to estimate the import of this legacy.
To whatever extent the strikingly personal musics of Maryanne Amacher, Bob Ashley, Evan Parker, Joan LaBarbara, La Monte Young, Laurie Anderson, Anthony Braxton, Mort Subotnick, David,Tudor, Alvin Lucier, David Behrman, Charlie Morrow, Terry Riley, Charlemagne Palestine, Chicago Arts Ensemble, Paul Dresher, Derek Bailey, Phill Niblock, Malcolm Goldstein, Glenn Branca, Joe Celli, George Lewis, Meredith Monk, Ivan Tcherepnin, Philip Corner, Louis Andreissen, Diamanda Galas, Frederic Rzewski, Rhys Chatham, Jerry Hunt, Leo Smith, Jon Gibson, Teitelbaum, Muhal Abrams, Larry Austin, Eugene Chadbourne, Misha Mengelberg, Pauline Oliveros, John Zorn, Glass and Reich and many others could be the seeds of today’s unplugged-diversity, this moment, this non-movement, has no doubt left a strong mark on musical life ever since; personally I am happy to have been a part of it.
Canti Illuminati, was of course my early tribute to the human voice, as the most natural source of music known. In this period there were many experiments going on in the world based on collective vocal improvisation -Pauline Oliveros’ Deep Listening work at UCSD, Roberto Laneri’s Roman group Prima Materia, David Hykes and his Harmonic Choir – in New York, now based in France, and my own work in group vocal Improvisation at the Accademia Nazionale d’Arte Drammatica in Rome, where I taught between 1975 and 1980. I always told my students: don’t forget! when the electricity gets turned off, you always have your voice/ your entire body as a basic musical instrument. When this work was being considered for an LP recording I decided to make it into a two part piece, which, on side one, explores a variegated soundscape of structured choral improvisation, and from this (side two) there emerges a solo platform for my own voice, tape delayed feedback, and my then trusty Serge Synthesizer and Sequencer. In later solo performances I concentrated entirely on this latter music, developing an intense and slowly expanding “microtonal” unison by matching my voice with a finely detuned keyboard. In retrospect this could be seen as a direct hommage to Giacinto Scelsi, who opened avenues of magical perspectives to many of us young composers in Rome at that time”.
Alvin Curran, October -November 2002
Complete reissue of the rare Lp, originally issued by Fore in 1982, with original cover and liner notes, plus an updated presentation written by the composer. Two side-long beautiful piece for voices, synthesizer, tapes and electronics, and one of Curran’s best works. Edition of 1000 copies.
Euro 15,00

Strange Attractors Audio House (US) :

Cul De Sac / Damo Suzuki “Abhayamudra” [2cd] Abhayamudra is a 2xCD collection of what Cul de Sac and Damo Suzuki consider to be the best moments of the 45 dates they played together – nearly 138 minutes of stunning psychedelic avant mayhem, performed live and composed entirely on the spot. Cul de Sac refract clusters of electronics, sorrowful violin and genre-defying surf/middle eastern guitar over chugging bass and astounding polyrhythms, whileSuzuki concocts his vocal somersaults over the affair, manipulating the direction of the tunes like it was liquid in a vessel. Abhaymudra immortalizes some very special moments captured on stage, a musical genesis that, by its very nature, could only be conceived at its particular moment in time and can never be replicated.
Euro 20,00

Touch (Uk) :

Oren Ambarchi “Grapes from the Estate” [cd] Oren’s third solo project for Touch sees him reaching beyond the work for electric guitar that he’s become recognized for, expanding his palette and taking his investigations into another sphere entirely. Grapes from the Estate features new instrumentation (strings, tuned bells, percussion and others that can only be guessed at), but the singular and unmistakable influence that Ambarchi exerts on these new materials is what makes it such an indelible work. There is a reconciliation of his love of song based music and his determination to deal in pure sound. The result is a work that truly eludes such arbitrary definitions. Grapes From The Estate is an all consuming experience that draws the listener out of an ordinary sense of time, into a world beyond it. On more than any other release, his entire body of work to date can be experienced in a single statement. There are the seemingly random tonal structures that are such a large part of his vocabulary, the playfulness and humor of his formative noise schooling, his love of free jazz, of pop music, and rhythmic elements, perhaps subconsciously derived from his Sephardic heritage. Another outpouring of personal, intimate and enduring music from Oren Ambarchi.”
Euro 16,00

Biosphere “Autour de la Lune” [cd] Fourth Biosphere release on Touch. “Widely regarded as one of Norwegian electronic music’s most important artists, Biosphere’s [Geir Jenssen] career spans nearly two decades, six albums, lots of remixes, various sound installations, commissions, soundtracks and even the odd Himalayan summit. Says Jenssen on his latest commission: ‘Radio France Culture contacted me some time ago and proposed a commission that was to be premiered at the Le Festival de Radio France et Montpellier. I was granted access to Radio France’s archives and given permission to use this vast source of audio material. I settled on this early 60s dramatisation of Jules Verne’s De la Terre à la Lune that totally captivated me. The story is quite amazing — Verne wrote it in the nineteenth century; still he managed to describe a manned space flight in such detail one is stunned. In De la Terre à la Lune Verne describes a space mission that sees the astronauts launched from Florida and returning from space to land in the Pacific Ocean — exactly the same procedure that the US space program would follow many, many years later. I have sampled bits and pieces of the dramatisation’s dialogue, coupled it with sounds recorded at the MIR space station and then incorporated it with my own compositions.’ Following the original broadcast, Jenssen continued to work on the recording which now sees the light of day as Autour de la Lune, a 74 minute symphony made up of nine ‘movements’. The propulsive opening sequence ‘Translation’ gives way to the crosstalk and scrambled communications of ‘Rotation’ and ‘Modifié’, before the listener is enveloped in a dense and seemingly endless space (the sound of zero gravity?). The circular flight of Autour de la Lune is Biosphere at his most expansive. Featuring a specially-commissioned painting by Tor-Magnus Lundeby, one of Norway’s most prominent visual artists, this new release is set to compete with Brian Eno’s ‘Apollo’ recordings as the definitive homage to the space age.”
Euro 16,00

Rosy Parlane “Iris” [cd] “Rosy Parlane lives in New Zealand; he began playing music with the avant-garde rock trio Thela. Thela released two CDs,Eponymous and Argentina on the label Ecstatic Peace! He subsequently began working with abstract electronic based music, both as a solo artist and as Parmentier with fellow Thela collaborator, Dion Workman. His full and intricate soundscapes are comprised of sample-loops, pianos, guitars, and field recordings manipulated via digital means. Parlane has released two solo albums on Sigma Editions, and a collaboration with Christian Fennesz on the Australian label, Synaesthesia [Live, SYN001]. Iris is the result of a concentrated period of activity and artistic development that will introduce Rosy Parlane to an audience hungry for innovative music. He both challenges and invigorates the current bias towards immersive sound, without ever losing sight of the human touch.”
Euro 16,00
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Turtle’s Dream (France) :

Kan Mikami “BACHI, Kashiwa Mura Kara” [cd] Nine songs recorded on Feb 16 and 17, 2004 by François Dietz at studio CCAM in Vandoeuvre-lès-Nancy during Kan MIKAMI’s French tour.
Kan Mikami : voice, guitar, Fabrice Eglin : feedback guitar on 9.
Kan MIKAMI is a guitar player, singer and songwriter grown up in Kodomari, a fishing village on the East coast of Japan. A student in Goshogawara, in 1967 he published a first book of poetry inspired by a teacher close to the beat generation. In 1969 he moved to Tokyo to become a cook. There he discovered the students’ social movement at the same time he got exposed to rock, jazz and contemporary music. These were times of radical protest against the establishment and a far too prudish culture, and asking for sexual liberation. In the 70s, with some other folksingers, Kan Mikami personified this generation through lyrics in turn erotic or obscene, sometimes violent or surrealist. During his heyday he recorded first for the independent label URC then for Victor and Columbia. Then he disappeared only to reappear ten years later on Tokyo’s underground scene acting in Yakuza films and on stage with Shoji Terayama, then recording more than ten solo albums for the cult Japanese label PSF, a contemporary counterpart to ESP. Kan Mikami has played with the great outsiders of improv, folk and Japanese rock: with Keiji Haino and Toshi Ishizuka in Vajra, with Masayoshi Urabe, Kazuki Tomokawa, Yosuke Yamashita, Akira Sakata and the late double-bass player Motoharu Yoshizawa. Only 21 minutes of music.
Euro 15,00

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Giuseppe Ielasi – Fringes Recordings
www.fringesrecordings.com
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