Posts tagged ‘spectropol’

December 27, 2015

Hamilton: Winding

Holiday surprise, as without warning I’m putting out this album featuring some of my own texture-focused ambient electronic tracks. I’d been sitting on it for a while and the time felt right…heck, it’s Spectropol’s 40th album!

Winding is a collection of tracks recorded between 2009 and 2012. Despite marked contrasts between them they comprise a coherent playlist of “ambient” electronic music. Some of the pieces work well for meditation, others are themselves meditations on sounds or ideas. Many of the works employ continuous slow-change forms and drones, others are keyboard-centered and have faster moving harmonies; some employ field recordings and most embrace noise. Microtonal elements are also present throughout, in different forms, including just intonation (this, muuf, window, furse, koni); mixed tunings (hoomz, hae, ronqq), and micro-inflections (elegy, furse, ronqq, dropov). As a whole I think of it as an ambient album realized with an avant-garde electroacoustic aesthetic.

Mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri.

It’s available now as a name-your-price download. You can also purchase ($10+s/h) an extremely limited edition CD-R (shipping in January).

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December 26, 2013

recent reviews

Here’s a round-up of some recent reviews.

Andrea Borghi – Musica per Nastro in Wonderful Wooden Reasons and in Kathodik (Italian)

C Dufallo/P Derivaz – Bass Violin, & Vincent Bergeron – Il y a seulement des apparitions in Monsieur Délire

J.C. Combs – Gazing,  Andrew Young – Inkplaces,  & Joel Taylor – Night Stories in Vital Weekly

Get the albums:

gazinginkplacesnightstoriesborghibassvapparitions

November 11, 2013

Possible Worlds Vol. 2 sampler

Check out this sampler track from Spectropol’s upcoming (11/15) microtonal compilation, featuring excerpts from Jacky Ligon, Mirjam Tally, Lewis Krauthamer, Lois Lancaster, Karen Keyhani, Christian Molenaar, Todd Harrop, Scott A. Moore, D. Edward Davis, Claudi Meneghin, Michael Vick and Kraig Grady.

January 3, 2013

akiyama/gburek out Jan. 5

Coming this Saturday; download and limited edition CDR.

tetuzi akiyama + jeff gburek: ‘respect’

These recorded improvisations from 2010 are a portrait of an evolving musical relationship between two well-traveled avant musicians. Quiet guitars and electronics interact over a bed of silence, an intimate post-Feldman environment where breathing and room sound permeate the texture. The east/west hybrid interests of both players seem to inform the subtle harmonic framework and the hypnotic flow of events. Jeff Gburek (Poland) recalls that between recorded segments the duo discussed moods/imagery, undetermined but subliminal suggestions. “In the middle of nowhere, the desert…” was an idea for the second track, which sparked Gburek’s “strong associative imagination with the New Mexico desert landscape and my sounds; because much of my sound vocabulary for that instrument set-up was developed while I was living in New Mexico.” Tetuzi Akiyama (Japan) had also been visiting New Mexico a few months before the recording, his slide guitar on that track perhaps redolent of the southwestern US. Overall these four tracks invite the listener into a unified and compelling experience, a meeting of musical presences enabled by patience and a willingness to explore.

respect cover text 3

August 9, 2012

new review of Berger Rond

Press has been steadily increasing for our releases. Here’s a very nice take on Elle Avait Raison Hathor from Oliver Arditi.

July 28, 2012

Micropangaea is available!

Brendan Byrnes has crafted an alluring concept album of prog/avant/electronica exploring tuning systems and imaginary terrain. Check it out via the animated site at micropangaea.com.

Or download/purchase it directly from bandcamp.

July 21, 2012

new Brendan Byrnes album out July 28

coming 7/28!

An arresting collection of microtonal electronica and avant-rock by Los Angeles-based composer/instrumentalist/producer Brendan Byrnes. The eight tracks each explore a different tuning system and are based on imaginary locations or features of Micropangaea, a fictional continent that will form on earth in the distant future. Byrnes, with the help of Michael Day, Brian Saia, Mike Horick, and a microtonal guitar ensemble, pulls the listener through instantly compelling song structures while pushing sonic boundaries. Liner notes for the album will presented uniquely in an animated website designed by Kerstin Hovland (TBA). —–brendanbyrnes.com—–

listen to a sampler here:

July 11, 2012

Lark [markings] now available!

Lark [markings] is an album of exploratory duos from woodwind player Paulo Chagas (Portugal) and ‘mosesa 2′ inventor/performer Wilhelm Matthies (USA). Each artist composed a graphic score for multiple recorded interpretations; these tracks are complimented by free improvisations.

The mosesa 2 (shown below) is a one-stringed instrument with variable bows & resonators, providing Matthies with a surprisingly large palette to paint sound with…a good thing given Chagas’ expansive and virtuosic instrumental range. The collaborative result is a playful, violent, warm, haunting, humorous, menacing, and surreal. It’s a musical funhouse. Available as a name-your-price download from the Spectropol Bandcamp site.

May 1, 2012

Elle avait raison Hathor live!

Vincent Berger Rond and cohorts will perform a rendition Elle avait raison Hathor (recently released on Spectropol) live in Montreal this Saturday, May 5.

Details here.

April 17, 2012

“Axe” electric guitar compilation now available

This long-awaited collection of experimental tracks featuring electric guitar is finally out for download and purchase.

Prepared guitar, computer processed, fretless, alternate tunings, noisy ambient, composed layers, unplugged-electric, controlled feedback, free improvisation, interlocking loops, virtuosic lines, shimmering drones, haunting melodies.

With Kavin Allenson, Tigress and the U-Fraidees, Bruce Hamilton, Mark Hamilton, Bill Horist, Neil Haverstick, Jukka-Pekka Kervinen, Steve Moyes, Marco Oppedisano, James Ross, Roger Sundstrom, Chris Vaisvil, the Michael Vick Trip, and Jordan Watson.

This compilation celebrates the electric guitar and its creative use with a collection of varied tracks that provide a small snapshot of what some artists and composers have been doing in 2010-2012.

Despite only eighty odd years of use (and even less as a widespread instrument), the electric guitar has been a major force of musical invention, forging new genres of music and new sonic territories to explore. Musicians today have a rich history to draw upon: Les Paul and other early masters, the various and celebrated icons of blues, rock, jazz and fusion; and several decades of guitarists extending their instruments through preparation and modification, processing, new playing techniques, and different tuning systems.

The music on this album is informed by the aesthetic, timbral, compositional and conceptual innovations of Derek Bailey, Adrian Belew, Glenn Branca, Robert Fripp, Bill Frisell, Fred Frith, Jimi Hendrix, Keith Rowe, and Elliott Sharp, to name but a few. Yet there are always more things to say, more avenues to explore, and more artists popping up to advance down these paths.