A Winged Victory For The Sullen - A Winged Victory For The Sullen

01. We Played Some Open Chords and Rejoiced, for the Earth Had Circled the Sun Yet Another Year
02. Requiem for the Static King, Part One
03. Requiem for the Static King, Part Two
04. Minuet for a Cheap Piano Number Two
05. Steep Hills of Vicodin Tears
06. A Symphony Pathetique
07. All Farewells are Sudden

We were always going to dig a band called 'A Winged Victory For The Sullen', but we're pleased to find that their music's actually very special too. It's a collaboration between composer Dustin O'Halloran and Stars Of The Lid's Adam Wiltzie, bolstered by contributions from Hildur Gudnadottir and Peter Broderick, and if you're familiar of the past work of all these sizeable talents then you'll have an idea of what to expect from the album: richly emotive chamber music with a supremely advanced grasp of space and atmosphere. 'We Played Some Open Chords' is the arresting opener, piano and string reverberations melting together imperceptibly before your very ears; 'Requiem For The Static King' is a fittingly beautiful elegy for the late Mark Linkous of Sparklehorse, and sure enough it seems to tremble with its own terrible sense of loss. We can't think of many albums of recent times that have so skilfully balanced droning minimalism with open, expressive melody; the results are completely bewitching, swelling to a near-symphonic climax in 'Steep Hills Of Vicodin Tears'. This is a grief-stricken album, make no mistake, but the sheer artistry at work makes it a resoundingly uplifting listen...www.boomkat.com

Rafael Anton Irisarri - Reverie (Second Edition)

1. Lit A Dawn
2. Embraced
3. Für Alina

Arriving around the same time as his greatly anticipated return as The Sight Below, this new LP from Rafael Anton Irisarri shows a different side to this talented composer/producer. Reverie pairs two brand new compositions with an interpretation of Arvo Pärt's classic 'Für Alina', arriving in an edition of 450 copies pressed onto black virgin vinyl, complete with download code. The A-side begins with 'Lit A Dawn', a typically dense and immersive composition that integrates pensive, tentatively paced piano figures with arcs of vaporous background ambience. The compressed and muffled quality of the recording only heightens the impact of the music itself: as slow and purposeful as it may be, it somehow also feels as if its on the verge of rupturing or breaking at the seams. After this lyrical opening, 'Embraced' takes on a more mysterious quality, sliding what seems to be submerged guitar figures across Eastern-style scales while a soupy, filtered production style lends an aloof, washed-out feeling. Taking up the entirety of the B-side, the extended 'Für Alina' is rendered with a reverent beauty, observing the meditative economy of Pärt's triadic 'tintinnabulation' style. Here the bell-like sonorities prompted by sustaining overtones is as important to the central harmonies themselves, and Irisarri certainly exhibits an understanding of this kind of detailed approach to minimalism. The piece is supremely graceful, dictated by a free flowing tempo and a mood of poised introspection. It fits Irisarri's own style of composition and performance perfectly, and he makes for an apt interpreter...www.boomkat.com

Jóhann Jóhannsson - The Miners' Hymns

1. They Being Dead Yet Speaketh
2. An Injury To One Is The Concern Of All
3. Freedom From Want and Fear
4. There Is No Safe Side But The Side Of Truth
5. Industrial And Provident, We Unite To Assist Each Other
6. The Cause Of Labour Is The Hope Of The World

In his book, London Under, Peter Ackroyd notes that the world beneath our feet can "move the imagination to awe and to horror". But, equally, it’s a locus for prodigious triumph and catastrophic ruin, as this collaboration between Icelandic composer Jóhann Jóhannsson and American filmmaker Bill Morrison unequivocally shows.

Taking the ill-fated mining community of Durham in northeast England as their subject, the pair has crafted a brooding, dark tribute focused on the appalling hardships of pit labour and the undeniable salience of the trade union movement in times of political cataclysm. Morrison deploys archival footage of the 1984 strike and the attendant running pitch battles with police alongside more genteel moments – charting the remarkable escalation of the prosaic towards the historic. Yet, despite the miner’s defiance, the eventual death knell of the industry had been sounded by Margaret Thatcher’s Conservative government and the flow of a community’s economic lifeblood had been staunched. In this light, The Miners’ Hymns becomes something of a fighters’ lament.

As Morrison’s arresting imagery filters through, the only sounds heard are those provided by Jóhannsson’s highly emotive score. The potency of the pictures’ powerful message can only be fully comprehended by hearing their audio accompaniment. By returning to the brass arrangements of 2004’s Virðulegu Forsetar, Jóhannsson is referencing both the popularity and symbolic importance of the region’s traditional colliery bands, while evoking Elgar’s distinctive brand of Englishness. But these supremely evocative compositions also percolate in fuggy, swirling miasmas, recalling not only Ingram Marshall’s Fog Tropes, but also the catalogues of other artists forging ghostly cavernous sonorities below the Earth’s crust, such as Pauline Oliveros with her deep listening cistern operations and Oliver Beer’s explorations of the resonances inherent in Victorian sewers. Here dwells the belly of the pit, the occupational heart of darkness.

While nowhere near as immediate as Jóhannsson’s string-based albums for the 4AD imprint – IBM 1401, A User’s Manual and the sublime Fordlândia – The Miners’ Hymns is far more complex in its use of dynamics while succeeding totally in its evocation of time, place and message. And those still seeking the attention-grabbing symphonies of before will no doubt get a suitable fix from the gloriously drilled The Cause of Labour is the Hope of the World, drawing to a rousing end this powerful testament to the plight of traditional labours and our nation’s working class...www.bbc.co.uk

Julianna Barwick & Ikue Mori - Frkwys Vol 6

01. dream sequence
02. stalactite castle
03. rain and shine at the lotus pond
04. rejoinder

Fresh from dropping her jaw-droppingly beautiful sophomore album The Magic Place, Julianna Barwick teams up with Ikue Mori of legendary New York no wavers DNA for a 12" of vocalisation and eldritch electronics. In the years since DNA tore apart the Gotham art scene, Mori has been busying herself as a distinguished developer of digital synth and drum machine and synth technology, and here she applies her considerable laptop chops to casting Barwick's plangent, patiently looped plainsong in a chattering, whirring, ever-shifting electronic setting that's too busy, mischievous and unsettling to be called ambient. The resulting work sounds resolutely modern, but has that eldritch, occluded quality of the BBC Radiophonic workshop and its hauntological devotees; it's certainly a more oblique and challenging listen than Barwick's more pop-influenced solo work. The music arose out of a performance commissioned by Manhattan's White Columns art space (which hosted Thurston Moore's seminal 1981 Noise Fest); something of a musical blind date, the duo improvised their parts live with a custom-built wall separating them, and the sounds they made were cut direct to vinyl via portable lathe. What you hear on this 12" isn't those lathe cuts, but rather recordings made in the same space a week later without an audience or dividing wall - "an exercise in actual engagement"...www.boomkat.com

Best of Hearts of Space, No.1: First Flight

01. Kitaro - Free Flight
02. Irene Papas & Vangelis - Neranzoula
03. Thomas de Hartmann - The Great Prayer
04. Michael Stearns - In The Beginning
05. Michael Stearns - Life In The Gravity Well
06. Michael Stearns - As The Earth Kissed The Moon
07. Deuter - Haleakala Mystery
08. Paul Lloyd Warner & Steve Kindler - Prisms
09. Charles Lloyd - Pathless Path
10. David Darling - Cycle Song

The nationally syndicated radio show, Hearts of Space celebrated it's 25th anniversary in 2008. After ten years as a local Bay Area program Hearts of Space emerged in January 1983 with syndication to 35 non-commercial radio stations. The program is now syndicated on over 200 NPR stations and XM Satellite Radio and boasts the second largest footprint of any current show on NPR.


From the beginning, the program's success has come from consistently high production quality and sensitive, knowledgeable music programming. The program has defined its own niche a mix of ambient, electronic, world, new age, classical and experimental music. Artists and record companies around the world recognize Hearts of Space as the original, most widely heard, premiere showcase for "contemplative music, broadly defined."


The Best of Hearts of Space: No. 1 First Flight is the first show aired from January 1, 1983. The show features what are now premier names in the format including Academy Award® winner Vangelis with Irene Papas, Grammy® Award winner Kitaro and Grammy® nominated David Darling. Other artists include Russian composer Thomas De Hartmann, instrumentalist Deuter, and pioneering ambient musician Michael Stearns...www.amazon.com

Jasper TX - Singing Stones

01. stillness
02. this barren land
03. they've flown away and left us here
04. last boat in
05. a box of wood in the storm
06. not leaving, not really
07. sleeping rivers
08. into the sea
09. mornings after

Very much a talent on the ascendence, Dag Rosenqvist returns with a swift follow-up to last year's Closet Ghosts EP, and the full-length on Miasmah, Black Sleep. While those two releases marked out career highpoints for Rosenqviist, Singing Stones finds him continuing on his upward trajectory, serving up a truly beautiful - not to mention accessible - collection of cinematic electronic compositions. You won't hear many artists who are this adept when it comes to wringing emotion from their laptops, and introductory track 'Stillness' provides an instantly breathtaking blend of lyrical digital timbres and immersive field recordings; you'll hear footsteps trudging across muddy ground and far off bells pealing out in the distance - it's lovely stuff. Next comes the exquisitely subtle 'This Barren Land', an electroacoustic drone piece that doesn't initially seem to be doing anything that's especially out of the ordinary, but the subtlety and depth of the piece ensures it worms its way into your heart. Now the tone is set, Rosenqvist opens up with some melodic developments, bringing delicate tuned percussion and filtered guitar progressions to 'They've Flown Away And Left Us Here', while 'Last Boat In' brings together fluttering vibraphone melodies and crashing waves on a beach. The set-adrift feel persists throughout, as cued by titles like 'A Box Of Wood In The Storm', 'Into The Sea' and 'Sleeping Rivers', the latter of which cultivates an Oren Ambarchi-like low-end drone, while flickers of hiss bombard slow-swelling chords. Singing Stones is an exceptional album, artfully constructed and sequenced in a way that preserves its enigmatic feel, continually shifting between coy tunefulness and glorious abstraction. Superb...www.boomkat.com

Anduin & Jasper TX - The Bending Of Light

1. A Beam of Light Folds Back Upon Itself…
2. … Producing Great Jets of Radiation.
3. Everything Disappears in a Tunnel of Light…
4. … Where a Star Once Was.
5. Like the Foot Prints of an Invisible Man…
6. … Walking in the Snow.

A classic case of a collaboration adding up to more than the sum of its parts, this incredible album arrived here with a fair amount of expectation but duly proceeded to completely blow us away with its utterly immersive blend of shimmering drones and densely crafted, submerged melodies. The SMTG label has already impressed us a great deal with a pristine lineup of releases from all manner of artists we love, but "The Bending of Light" must surely rank as the best thing on the label yet. Many of you will no doubt already be familiar with the work of both Jasper TX and Anduin, but despite the high calibre of material from both camps they seem to have struck something entirely more developed and engrossing working together. Opening track "A Beam of Light Bends Back Upon Itself" is interesting enough with its slow-building drone haze, but its when second track "Producing Great jets of Radiation" hits that you realise that you're in the presence of something truly important and great. It's a track that nervously builds from the low registers with a Deathprod style dose of uncertainty and darkness slowly overcome by strained beams of light and distortion, like Tim Hecker manipulating a church organ - but before you get a chance to register the full scope of frequencies the track fades out to an abrupt end. "Where a Star Once Was" is another highlight, a creaking, pulsating recording doused with unusual, nautical found sounds and barely audible keys shifting into focus with one half embracing melody and the other engulfed by the icy tundras you'd more readily associate with someone like Mika Vainio. It's dark, dense, overwhelming music. "Like The Foot Prints.." takes an engrossing diversion and clears aural mists for a much more vulnerable kind of music, a slow pulsating heartbeat and immensely beautiful notes riding underneath a humming, delicately balanced drone and restrained strums, sounding not unlike classic Pan American but with a more pregnant emotional core. The album ends with "Walking in the Snow", a monochrome rendition that barely manages to contain the warm embers of memory and nostalgia underneath, so much so that you can imagine it bookending a lost vintage era recording from the Cocteau Twins, high praise indeed. Incredible music - and an utterly Essential Purchase!...www.boomkat.com

Sylvain Chauveau - The Black Book Of Capitalism

01. Et Peu A Peu Les Flots Respiraient Comme On Pleure
02. JLG
03. Hurlements En Faveur De Serge T.
04. Le Marin Rejete Par La Mer
05. Derniere Etape Avant Le Silence
06. Dialogues Avec Le Vent
07. Ses Mains Tremblent Encore
08. Ma Contribution A L'industrie Phonographique
09. Geographie Intime
10. Je Suis Vivant Et Vous Etes Morts
11. Mon Royaume
12. Potlatch (1971-1999)
13. Un Souffle Remua La Nuit

Sylvain Chauveau is one of those artists we hear mentioned a great deal, yet he has proven strangely elusive when it comes to tracking down his work. Best known (and easiest to get hold of) is his seminal Fat Cat album 'Un Autre Decembre' which set him up as one of the world's premier exponents of the electronic/classical sound, but Sylvain had already been releasing records long before that album hit the shelves. 'The Black Book of Capitalism' originally appeared in 2000 on the French DSA imprint and sadly never hit UK shores, but Type (Sylvain's new base of operations) have managed to put together a gloriously remastered and repackaged version for the wider world to hear at last. Those of you who have been enamoured with the artist's stark, minimal sound might be shocked at first to hear the variety on offer; 'The Black Book of Capitalism' is far from a mere classical record, and shows a breadth of sound never again seen
in Sylvain's catalogue to date. From the mournful, delicate piano-work of 'Et Peu a Peu les Flots...' we musical expertise, with the doomy almost Bohren-esque jazz of 'Hurlements en Favour de Serge T.' and through a chiming fairytale with 'Derniere Etape avant le Silence'.

There are almost traces of Angelo Badalamenti's work lost in the grooves here, with the
gauzy world of European cinema seeping from every crack and punctuating Sylvain's compositions with both confidence and a deft humour. It might be over eight years old now but nothing of the album has been lost with time, it has matured with age, showing new depths and character with every year that has gone by. With 'The Black Book of Capitalism' Sylvain delivered his most widescreen work so far and it's an absolute pleasure to be able to hear it again in all its glory.

Ólafur Arnalds - Found Songs

1. Romance
2. Raein
3. Allt varð hljótt
4. Erla's Waltz
5. Ljósið
6. Faun
7. Lost Song

With the critically acclaimed debut album 'Eulogy for Evolution' and follow-up EP 'Variations of Static' – both released on the cinematic music label Erased Tapes – under his belt, Icelandic neo-classical composer Ólafur Arnalds embarks on a brand new collection of tracks entitled ‘Found Songs’. Each track from this series will be created and released within 24 hours.

For the first time Ólafur will compose and release a track daily – an idea which he developed as a way to collate several lost and found musical sketches and ideas in a 'very challenging, but fun' series. From Monday April 13th, Arnalds will create a song a day, for 7 days – instantly making each track available and keeping his fans up to date on the artist’s Twitter...www.foundsongs.erasedtapes.com

William Basinski - 92982

01. 92982.1
02. 92982.2
03. 92982.4
04. 92982.3

This month sees the release of a new album by William Basinski, the veteran L.A.-based artist known for his groundbreaking, achingly romantic ambient/drone work - most famously Shortwavemusic (Raster-Noton, 1998) and The Disintegration Loops I-IV (2062, 2002-3).

92982 is the first “new” music from the flamboyant 51-year-old since last year’s collaboration with Richard Chartier, Untitled I-III; like so many Basinski releases, it’s actually based on archival recordings from way back when. He explains:

“[92982 is] something from a long time ago…In Brooklyn, 351 Jay Street…A fruitful evening in the studio…Home at last after a day of work at the answering service, answering phones for Calvin Klein, Bianca Jagger, Steve Rubell, and all the other somebody people…

“In our space station: home in my studio experimenting live. James is in the adjacent studio painting masterpieces. Roger is in the front, gluing old shoes on canvas and painting them orange...I’m clicking the old Norelcos back and forth between channels…All the windows are open. The sound is spreading all over downtown Brooklyn mixing with the helicopters, sirens, pot smoke and fireworks…

“It’s crunchy, it’s distorted…it’s Basinski archive circa 1982. The third track some of you may recognize: a shorter version was included as ‘Variation #8’ on Variations: A Movement In Chrome Primitive. So, this night in the studio spawned a direction I would follow for some time. As I love this document of that night, I thought you might like to put what came later into context, so I’m releasing this archival recording. The last track is a newly recorded reprise of the first track that I recorded with the original loop in February 2009 in Los Angeles.”

92982 is out on April 20th via Basinski’s own 2062 label. A couple of beguilingly pretty excerpts from the album are currently streaming over at his myspace...www.factmagazine.co.uk

Peter Broderick - Ten Duets

A1 Piano & Toy Piano
A2 Travel Guitar & Thundermachine
A3 Viola & Laptop
A4 Shaker & Kalimba
A5 Pump Organ & Handbells
B1 Violin & Mouth
B2 Mandolin & Theremin
B3 Field Recorder & Postcard Weevil
B4 Nylon Guitar & Violin
B5 Banjo & Piano

Ok, so only 300 of these babies were made, of which we have exactly 150. They won't last very long and, no, we won't ever get any more copies so please dont email us to ask! The release itself is another seemingly effortless bundle of loveliness from the super-young, super-talented Mr Broderick, displaying his skills across 10 tracks clocking in at a total of 35 minutes, each one doing exactly what it says on the tin with a 'duet' between two instruments. The opening track features piano and toy piano and is the sort of things that so many musicians we can think of would tear their right arm off to produce, and yet here it is tucked away in a super obscure limited edition pressing on cassette. That's what we love about what we do, and why its so much fun operating under the radar - snooze and you lose. Anyway, onto the next track and an incredible tussle between a 'Travel guitar' and 'Thunder machine', a perfect blend of the kind of immense, submerged drones last heard on Richard Harrison's awesome 'Drone Hill', and distilled guitar strumming that would make Ry Cooder blush. Ok, it's a lazy comparison, but the track is anything but and is truly a thing of some considerable magnificence and wonder. And so the tracks continue, each one out-doing the last, and then the whole thing just ends and you remember that you have to do things like rewind and ffwd to find the tracks you want to hear again because its all on lovely warm analogue tape. Oh, and it comes with a little photocopied note from Mr Broderick himself, and a foldout inlay with a little picture for each track so you can see what the instruments look like. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant stuff - run like the wind if you want one...www.boomkat.com

UNKLE - Remix Stories Volume 2

01. Trouble In Paradise (Variation On A Theme) (Carl Craig C2 Remix)
02. Hold My Hand (Innervisions Orchestra Dub Mix)
03. Hold My Hand (Innervisions Orchestra Instrumental Mix)
04. Heaven (King Unique Remix)
05. Heaven (King Unique Bass Bliss Remix)
06. Heaven (King Unique Accapella Remix)
07. Trouble In Paradise (Variation On A Theme) (Fergie Excentric Mix)
08. Keys To The Kingdom (Lee Coombs Remix)

Remix Stories Vol. 2 is a Ep released by Unkle, it is the second in a series of unreleased remixes from their album War Stories and End Titles... Stories for Film. The Ep will be released on Beatport and vinyl on April 6th, though the vinyl version will be limited to 150 copies. The digital version contains all the songs from the vinyl version, as well as 6 additional remixes...www.wikipedia.org

Fennesz - Black Sea

1. Black Sea
2. The Colour of Three
3. Perfume for Winter
4. Grey Scale
5. Glide
6. Vacuum
7. Glass Ceiling
8. Saffron Revolution

Christian Fennesz's follow up to 2004's Venice is upon us, and it's not likely to leave anyone disappointed. The ten-minute title track gets the album underway, opening tentatively with flickers of noise and digital debris crackling like fireworks in the distance. Soon a flood of symphonic guitar and electronics overwhelms the mix and we're reintroduced to the signature sound world that's unique to this man's music - he's one of the most imitated electronic artists out there, and yet you can always pick out the real thing from a line-up of clones. Not resting on his laurels, before 'Black Sea' is even three minutes in, the magnitude shrinks down to a simple duet between oscillating tones and brittle acoustic guitar plucks. It's from here that the piece begins to swell up with majestic, incredibly warm sustains and scratchy textural details - the whole composition feels like a reintroduction to the various facets of the Fennesz sound. Next comes the first of two collaborative pieces (although it should be pointed out that this one isn't available on the vinyl edition - and while we're on the subject, nor is the ambient miniature 'Vacuum' encountered towards the end of the CD and digital tracklists): 'The Colour Of Three' features Anthony Pateras (a veteran of Editions Mego and Sirr), who supplies some nicely clanking prepared piano tones, placing emphasis on the instrument as a percussive device rather than a string instrument. Despite this augmented instrumental range we're still in familiar territory thanks to Fennesz's transcendent digital eruptions and gloriously rich sound designs. 'Perfume For Winter' is a more restrained affair, filled with contemplative acoustic figures and abrupt organ-driven chord changes. We get our first real taste of explicit melody here, reminiscent of Endless Summer's most approachable tracks. Importantly though, there are no overt attempts to retrace footsteps back to that classic album, and Black Sea sounds vehemently like a step forwards for Fennesz. This sense of progression is underlined by the spine-tinglingly wonderful 'Glide', a duet with Rosy Parlane which takes Fennesz's wall of sound into the stratosphere, sounding like an unearthly orchestra. The music itself matches the increased magnitude: if Endless Summer was a digitisation and abstraction of The Beach Boys, 'Glide' could be said to apply the same transformative techniques to more classically-geared sounds - there's an undercurrent of elegiac romanticism that might reasonably be compared to fellow notable Austrian, Gustav Mahler, specifically the well-known fourth movement of his 5th Symphony (once famously plundered by Robert Lippok for his Open/Close/Open release on Raster Noton). After the quietly glistening, chime-like tones of 'Glass Ceiling' comes previous single and album finale 'Saffron Revolution', which is a suitably grand closing gesture, stretching out a single, euphoric multi-layered chord across much of its duration before dissipating away into a pattern of delayed string plucks. Black Sea is far and away one of the year's most beautiful records, both in terms of the music itself and the sheer iridescence of the electronic sound harnessed within. Very highly recommended indeed...www.boomkat.com

Jacaszek - Pentral

1. I  

2. II  

3. III  

4. IV  

5. V  

6. VI  

7. VII  

8. VII 

9. IX  

10. X 

The new project is an attempt to describe a gothic church interior by means of sounds. A temple ownes its special atmosphere not only to visual elements but also to characteristic acoustics – reverb, enhancingand prolonging a slightest whisper into infinity. I have spent several days in three Gdansk historic churches (Oliwa Cathedral, St. Nicolas’ church, St. Mary’s Basilica) recording chanting, organs, and also a broad spectrum of accidental noises. Source sounds were were used only as a stimulus which releases the sound of the whole inside, and as such, they were consequently retouched in the post production process. Studio work and also the atmosphere of melody and arrangements were subordinate to the idea of portraying the church as a place filled with distant mysteries, a huge music instrument.