Cuneiform Records New Releases/Artist News September 2007. Click For Infos.CUNEIFORM RECORDS NEW RELEASES / ARTIST NEWS SEPTEMBER 2007
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NEW RELEASES FOR SEPT 18, 2007:
AHLEUCHATISTAS – EVEN IN THE MIDST… (Rune 261)
[ROCK / AVANT-PUNK]
VINNY GOLIA, AURORA JOSEPHSON, HENRY KAISER, MIKE KENEALLY, JOE MORRIS, DAMON
SMITH, WEASEL WALTER – HEALING FORCE: THE SONGS OF ALBERT AYLER (Rune 255)
[JAZZ / FREE JAZZ]
RICHARD LEO JOHNSON & GREGG BENDIAN – WHO KNEW CHARLIE SHOE? (Rune 258)
[ROCK / ACOUSTIC GUITAR]
RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL – RAIN FALLS IN GREY (Rune 256)
[ELECTRONIC / ROCK / SPACE ROCK]
TIME OF ORCHIDS – NAMESAKE CAUTION (Rune 257)
[ROCK / AVANT-ROCK]
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AHLEUCHATISTAS – EVEN IN THE MIDST… (Rune 261)
GENRE: ROCK / AVANT-PUNK
An all-instrumental guitar/bass/drums trio whose music “resides at the meteoric
end of the tempo spectrum” [Splendid], Ahleuchatistas is in the front ranks of a
youthful musical movement fusing the energy and attitude of punk, the power of
metal, and the fractured, angular compositions and irregular, shard-like meters
of avant rock to create music perhaps best-described as avant-punk. Favoring a
clean, stripped-down sound and a delivery devoid of pretension, and possessing
super-human chops, the trio plays short, compressed and complex polyrhythmic
compositions with unrelenting speed, unrestrained joy, and near-telepathic
precision; what Organ calls “dazzling, stripped-down yet mega-complex sonic
acrobatics.” The trio’s interplay in “controlled chaos” leaves listeners
awestruck: “…they’re astonishingly together even on passages where it seems
downright impossible to stay in sync,” [Pitchfork]. Critics have described their
music as “spiritually overseen by the likes of Robert Fripp, Damon Che and John
Zorn… recalling the restless avant-punk zeal of End Hits-era Fugazi and the
pulsingly organic hyperactivity of early King Crimson” [Splendid], while
comparing it to bands like Ruins, Massacre (Laswell/Frith/Hayward), Lightening
Bolt, Dysrhythmia, Don Caballero, Hella, Sonna, Shellac and Upsilon Acrux.
Critics variously define it as math-rock, technical metal, speed-rock,
avant-punk or avant-progressive, while invariably recognizing Ahleuchatistas’
music as the best of its kind. On Even In the Midst…, the band’s fourth release
and second CD on Cuneiform Records, Ahleuchatistas have further honed its unique
version of avant-punk, distilling stylistic extremes into multifaceted sonic
mosaics that assume organic form.
VINNY GOLIA, AURORA JOSEPHSON, HENRY KAISER, MIKE KENEALLY, JOE MORRIS, DAMON
SMITH, WEASEL WALTER – HEALING FORCE: THE SONGS OF ALBERT AYLER (Rune 255)
GENRE: JAZZ / FREE JAZZ
Healing Force: The Songs of Albert Ayler is a heartfelt and joyous tribute to,
and exploration of, the vocally oriented music that saxophonist and free jazz
innovator Albert Ayler created in the last three years of his life. Believing
that Ayler’s late works were ripe with ideas that were not fully realized at the
time, nor appreciated up to the present, world-renown improviser Henry Kaiser, a
guitarist and producer with a well-documented history of exploring sonic and
geographic extremes, put together a special project to revisit and re-explore
Ayler’s songs. He assembled an all-star septet of players from the art-punk,
brutal-prog, free-jazz, improvisational and modern jazz world, in keeping with
Ayler’s propensity to use, in his late works, larger lineups that included
established musicians from both within the jazz world as well as outside (Blues,
rock, R&B, soul). The lineup for the Healing Force project included Vinny Golia
(reeds), Aurora Josephson (voice), Henry Kaiser (guitar), Mike Keneally (piano,
guitar, voice), Joe Morris (guitar, bass), Damon Smith (bass) and Weasel Walter
(drums). These seven musicians chose a representative sample of Ayler’s late
songs: “Universal Indians” from Love Cry; “Message from Albert,” “Thank God for
Women,” “Heart Love,” “New Generation” and “New Ghosts” from New Grass; and
“Music is the Healing Force of the Universe,” “A Man is Like a Tree” and “Oh!
Love of Life” from Music is the Healing Force of the Universe. Sharing a desire
“to send the people of earth a message of love, peace, and spiritual
understanding,” Kaiser mentioned that the group held brief “discussions of what
we might try to do with each tune” and then “essentially let it [the music] play
through us.” The result was Healing Force: The Songs of Albert Ayler, released
here by Cuneiform. It is hoped that the performances on Healing Force: The Songs
of Albert Ayler will encourage new appreciation of this music.
RICHARD LEO JOHNSON & GREGG BENDIAN – WHO KNEW CHARLIE SHOE? (Rune 258)
GENRE: ROCK / ACOUSTIC GUITAR
“Legends aren’t often freshly minted,” said Jazz Times in its review of
guitarist Richard Leo Johnson’s last release, The Legend of Vernon McAlister,
“but Vernon McAlister may be one of them.” Indeed, since it emerged from the
hollow steel body of Johnson’s National Duolian guitar, Johnson’s “Legend” has
taken on a life of its own. Enchanted by the sounds that emanated from the
guitar’s rusted hollow, he wove a fictional tale of its owner, sequestered
himself in his attic and brought the antique instrument to life, unleashing the
sonic wonderland hidden within the instrument, recording a solo album with only
the guitar and some old mics. The result was Johnson’s 2006 Cuneiform release,
The Legend of Vernon McAlister, an astonishing, hauntingly beautiful work of new
acoustic Americana, which served as a soundtrack, or “aural” history, to a
written “legend” of Vernon McAlister, posted on www.vernonmcalister.com. As the
legend continues, when a new fictional character, Charlie Shoe, encounters
Vernon’s guitar, “it still had the wild animals living in it, and the trains,
and the fires, and the angels, and the love, and the trouble.” In Who Knew
Charlie Shoe?, Johnson expands on the lessons, legend and instrumentation of
Vernon, working with percussionist Gregg Bendian to reveal that music and magic
reside in the everyday – in commonplace objects and even in trash – and do not
reside solely in one very special, mysteriously inscribed, metal guitar. The new
CD’s liner notes feature the story of Charlie Shoe, Vernon’s protégé, which is
elaborated online at www.charlie-shoe.com. With Johnson adopting the persona of
Charlie Shoe and playing dime-a-dozen acoustic guitars bought off eBay, and
Bendian, aka Junk Fish, aka Jaden Barrel, playing percussion on “stuff” ranging
from lard cans, brooms, pots, washboards, attic stairs, water and more, the duo
expand on Johnson’s singular, acoustic Americana hybrid. Together, Johnson and
Bendian create music that is simultaneously traditional and experimental,
merging past with present and avant-garde found object with folksy “swap-meet”
discard.
RADIO MASSACRE INTERNATIONAL – RAIN FALLS IN GREY (Rune 256)
GENRE: ELECTRONIC / ROCK / SPACE ROCK
Rain Falls in Grey, the newest release by England’s prolific electronic wizards,
Radio Massacre International (RMI), is dedicated to the late guitarist Syd
Barrett, who died in 2006. His death “forced us to consider what an enormous
influence he was,” says RMI. Barrett made numerous musical innovations that
permanently impacted British rock during his intense, brief musical career
(1965-72), cut short when he became rock’s first “acid casualty”. Barrett opened
London’s doors to psychedelia and progressive rock as the co-founder, lead
guitarist, composer and driving force behind Pink Floyd, England’s most popular
psychedelic band, which released multiple singles and an album under his watch.
His compositions imploded pop’s song structure – as did those of his Soft
Machine friends, who shared Pink Floyd’s stage and recorded on Barrett’s 1970
solo albums – in songs like “Interstellar Overdrive,” a “wildly unpredictable,
chemically-inspired instrumental of indeterminate length” [Mojo] which devolved
into lengthy, improvised jams influenced by free jazz. Barrett introduced a
‘dark side’ into pop music, using edgy lyrics and subject matter, experimenting
with new, sometimes unpleasant sonic effects, including noise, distortion, and
feedback; and inventing “glissando” guitar effects by “sliding a Zippo lighter
up and down the fret-board through an old echo box to create mysterious,
otherworldly sounds.” He popularized the use of electronic equipment alongside
standard rock instrumentation, causing Paul McCartney to praise Pink Floyd’s
integration of electronic instruments, studio techniques and rock music as the
wave of the future. Said RMI, “For those of us engaged in experimental or space
rock, the debt is enormous.” Engrossed in recording a new album of improvised
electronic music at the time of Barrett’s death, RMI recorded several tracks as
a spontaneous tribute. Later that year, while performing at Amsterdam’s Gong
Unconvention, RMI asked artist and musician Daevid Allen – the co-founder of
Soft Machine and leader of psychedelic Gong, who acquired his own glissando
guitar technique from Barrett – to create special art work for the CD. As
released here by Cuneiform and featuring Allen’s artwork, RMI’s new CD is titled
Rain Falls in Grey after a quote from Barrett’s “Baby Lemonade”, a song RMI felt
“summed up the elegiac mood when we first reflected on his passing.” A
collection of space rock that boldly departs from RMI’s customary all-electronic
space improvisations by expanding the group’s sound with more conventional rock
instrumentation and guest musicians on reeds and electric violin, Rain Falls in
Grey serves as a “celebration of the eternal life and energy that pioneers such
as Syd Barrett give through their music…and the sadness when they lose their way
like he did.”
TIME OF ORCHIDS – NAMESAKE CAUTION (Rune 257)
GENRE: ROCK / AVANT-ROCK
The visionary, New York City-based avant-rock band Time of Orchids creates songs
that are darkly beautiful, pop-drenched sonic maelstroms, steeped in psychedelia
and infused with lush vocals. Plundering the ruins of pop culture, the band’s
music is informed as much by modern rock (metal, industrial, post-rock,
avant-progressive, new wave/no wave, pop) as by 1960s Italian film scores and a
touch of classical music. The band members cite influences as wide-ranging as
John Barry/Ennio Morricone, Mr. Bungle, Cheer-Accident, Nirvana, Thinking
Plague, The Magic Band, Cocteau Twins, Yes, Madonna, The Spice Girls, The
B-52’s, Gorecki, Shostakovich, Shudder to Think, Primus, Police, Olivier
Messiaen, Igor Stravinsky, Dystopa, Gorguts, Kayo Dot, Swans, the spirit of
Frank Zappa, “tons of adventurous rock,” choirs, “stuff with soul and real
desperation” and much, much more… While the resulting sound is unique, Time of
Orchids share an aesthetic and approach with such other early 21st century
genre-defying avant-rock bands as Radiohead, Sleepytime Guerilla Museum,
Cheer-Accident, and the Cuneiform band Alec K. Redfearn & the Eyesores, all of
whom defy musical convention by processing multiple subgenres of popular music
to create a unique sound. On Namesake Caution, the newest (fifth!) release and
first recording for Cuneiform Records, Time of Orchids continue to transcend the
limits of genre and form by distilling a unique sonic brew into their most
stylistically mature, cohesive, and aesthetically and emotionally potent work to
date. A wedding of dark musical imagery, sweeping sonics, angular and
intricately staggered composition, and evocative, elliptical poetry, all richly
interlaced with dream-pop vocal harmonies that meld the Beach Boys and Yes,
Namesake Caution is emotionally breathtaking and aurally intoxicating.
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CUNEIFORM RECORDS ARTIST NEWS SEPTEMBER 2007
compiled by Ben, at ben@cuneiformrecords.com
as always, in addition see www.cuneiformrecords.com
Ahleuchatistas
Birdsongs of the Mesozoic
David Borden/Mother Mallard
Amy Denio
Nick Didkovsky/Doctor Nerve
Djam Karet
Far Corner
Mats/Morgan Band
Chris McGregor/Brotherhood of Breath
The Microscopic Septet
Shawn Persinger/Boud Dean
Picchio dal Pozzo
Richard Pinhas
Alec K. Redfearn & The Eyesores
Thinking Plague
Time of Orchids
University of Errors
Yang
&
CUNEIFORM ARTIST TOURS
