Utility Fog

Sunday, 2nd of June, 2013

Tonight's show has a healthy dose of speedy beats & breaks, some glitched and non-glitched acoustic instrumentation, and some brilliant out-there songwriting.

Listen again or for the first time, on the podcast, downloadable below, or in stereo on your mobile or computer streamed on demand from FBi.

UFog favourite Fanu this week released an amazing compilation of Finnish drum'n'bass & breaks on his Bandcamp. We started with Recue and then heard from two fairly well established Finnish drum'n'bass artists, Resound and Mineral.

And then we're into a nice special on one of Japan's nicest artists & labelowners, aus aka Yasuhiko Fukuzono of flau records. The delightfully named Plop label has just released a ReCollected, a collection of his remixes for people over the years. There's some ace stuff there, including both his folktronic beats & edits and his more ambient/post-classical styles — and there are new tracks even for a fan like myself, such as the excellent idm of his Fedaden remix. I played an assortment of aus tracks from across his career (although I wish I'd had time to play more!) and couldn't resist slipping in a remix of aus too, from UFog-favourite Bracken.

It's only suitable we follow up with the latest release from Yasuhiko's own flau records, a real beauty from French/Belgian trio 0, featuring Sylvain Chauveau along with Stéphane Garin and Joël Merah, playing an assortment of acoustic instruments and building a lovely quasi-folktronic sound without, as far as I can see, the aid of computers.

Ah... folktronica! I never lost the faith, although it's fair to say as any kind of cohesive sound it started years before it was really identified and only really lasted a couple of years after. If that makes any kind of sense. This year is the 10th anniversary of one of the true classics, Four Tet's Rounds, and you can read my tribute to the album along with the lovely Lexy Savvides' on the FBi website. Tonight I decided not to play any tracks from that wonderful release, but rather give a couple of tastes of some contemporaneous tracks. I was a little disappointed that the bonus disc contains just a live concert from 2004, great though it is — I own one of the very limited copies that Domino released at the time. But there were so many amazing b-sides, remixes, and compilation tracks from around the same time that continue to languish in comparative obscurity. "Cradle" was the b-side to the "She Moves She" 12", and it sits comfortably with the Rounds tracks; "Both when you are alone and we both are" is an ultra-glitchy and ultra-beautiful track from a split 7" with, of all people, Hella.

Our shortish Greg Haines retrospective is apt not only because he has a surprising new album mixing minimal dub/techno with his post-classical compositions, but becuase Denovali are also releasing a multi-disc set compiling his first three albums, including the stunning debut on Miasmah. His orchestral and chamber compositions have often been accompanied by electronic elements, and his live shows involve looping on computers and lovely lo-fi cassette samples — but the new album Where We Were moves him closer to the dancefloor (sortof) than he's ever been before. We also heard one of his solo piano pieces released last year by Kning Disk.

I've been meaning to do a retrospective on the amazing music of Melbourne's Terminal Sound System, but tonight had time to just play one track from his latest album, also on Denovali. Stay tuned!

And finally, Norwegian experimental songwriter Jenny Hval, for a time resident in Melbourne, has released her second album on Rune Grammofon. While not as instantly mind-blowing as the previous, it's similar in outlook and features a lot of the same musicians — lyrically simultaneously obtuse and uncomfortably frank, and musically both catchy and uncompromisingly experimental, it's a must-listen.

Recue - Get It Started [Fanu Bandcamp]
Resound and Mineral - Uncertain Soundscapes [Fanu Bandcamp]
Fedaden - Verdad (aus remix feat. Yukiko Okamoto) [Plop] {originally released on Nacopajaz}
Cokiyu - Gloomy Monday (aus remix) [flau] {also available on the new remix collection on Plop}
aus - Midnight Wedding [u-cover]
aus - Moraine [Preco]
aus - Moraine (Bracken remix) [Preco]
Motoro Faam - a change of a cityscape (aus remix) [u-cover] {also available on the new remix collection on Plop}
0 - Soñando 6 [flau]
0 - Soñando 5 [flau]
Four Tet - Cradle [Domino]
Four Tet - Both when you are alone and we both are [Ache Records]
Greg Haines - The Intruder [Denovali]
Greg Haines - Snow Airport [Miasmah]
Greg Haines - Peter's Advice [Kning Disk]
Greg Haines - Something Happened [Denovali]
Terminal Sound System - Clearlight [Denovali]
jenny hval - is there anything on me that doesn't speak [Rune Grammofon]
jenny hval - blood flight [Rune Grammofon]

Listen again — ~ 104MB

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