Playlist 05.08.18 (9:09 pm)
Your weekly eclectic selection, crossing between electronic, experimental, post-classical, world and jazz tonight.
LISTEN AGAIN for words and music across the world... stream on demand from FBi, podcast here.
hence therefore - ashfield park [3bs Records]
hence therefore - admitting [3bs Records]
Simon Unwin has been based in London for a couple of years now, but he's still Sydney's Hence Therefore, and indeed his new ambient album Strata is released once again on Sydney-based 3BS Records. In the vein of Aphex Twin's SAW II or Coil's Musick To Play In The Dark it's shimmering, moody stuff made of deceptively simple elements, and it's a real beauty.
Erik Friedlander - 1000 Steps [Erik Friedlander Bandcamp]
For a little while, legendary Downtown New York cellist Erik Friedlander has been releasing single tracks as part of his River project in which he uses the studio as a musical instrument. It's resulted in some interesting experimental works. This one also features Satoshi Takeishi on percussion.
Elsen Price - D Major [self-released]
...interview with Elsen Price...
Plait Ensemble - Where Is My Money [Elsen Price Bandcamp]
...more interview with Elsen Price...
Ephemera Trio - Floating In Space [Ephemera Trio Bandcamp]
Eishan Ensemble - Nim Dong [Art As Catharsis]
Very nice chatting with Sydney double bassist Elsen Price about all the groups he's involved with! We started with a lovely piece of double bass looping and improvising from the originally self-trained (but now qualified in classical and jazz) musician. He's playing this Friday August 10th at St Stephen's church on Macquarie St in Sydney's CBD, doing a program of contemporary compositions and maybe a bit of improvised double bass. And then he's playing with his various ensembles at Extended Play, 12-hour mini-festival of New Music (in all its forms) at City Recital Hall, also in Sydney's CBD. (Hot tip: you can see me playing solo as raven as well...) Plait Ensemble is Elsen's compositions performed by an ensemble made up of musicians from different backgrounds - jazz, classical Armenian, Persian, Japanese - and the music is as gregarious as you'd expect. Persian tar player Hamed Sadeghi leads Eishan Ensemble, which shares a few members with Plait and whose album Nim Dong was recently released through Sydney's excellent Art As Catharsis. And Ephemera is led by flute/piano player Keyna Wilkins, along with Elsen on bass, and members on trumpet and viola, inspired by (and sampling) sounds from the solar system and beyond.
Lekhfa (Maryam Saleh, Tamer Abu Ghazaleh, Maurice Louca) - Teskar Tebki [Mostakell]
Lekhfa (Maryam Saleh, Tamer Abu Ghazaleh, Maurice Louca) - El Shahwa Wel Soarr [Mostakell]
I was blown away by the new album by Nadah El Shazly earlier this year, and was delighted when she was featured on the cover of The Wire in a piece about the underground & experimental music scene from Cairo. Earlier this year El Shazly contribued an incredible playlist of contemporary Egyptian music to The Wire, featuring a piece by the Lekhfa trio as well as work from familiar names to UFog like Zuli as well as many names that were new to me. Made up of popular singers in the Egyptian alternative scene Maryam Saleh and Tamer Abu Ghazaleh along with adventurous producer & multi-instrumentalist Maurice Louca, Lekhfa is a hugely exciting discovery - lovely Egyptian songs in a leftfield indie/electronic setting.
Happy Axe - Seven Sounds [Spirit Level/Happy Axe Bandcamp]
I wrote last week about how awesome Emma Kelly's debut Happy Axe album Dream Punching is. It's so good I'm playing another selection this week - one which starts with just lots of violins along with the vocals, but then adds some heavy bass and skittering beats into the mix 2/3 of the way in, and finishes with glitched-up vocal delays. Magnificent.
Andrée Greenwell & Ali Cobby Eckermann - I Am A Survivor [Andrée Greenwell Bandcamp]
Andrée Greenwell & Candy Royalle - Fire [Andrée Greenwell Bandcamp]
The powerful and important new work from Andrée Greenwell, Listen to Me, was premiered on the FBi Radio-produced, nationally syndicated show All The Best. Part documentary, part creative work, its subject matter is gendered violence, and it's a mosaic of spoken word, performance poetry and song, with music and songwriting by Greenwell and guest performances and words contributed by a raft of brilliant Australian women. It's beautiful and moving to hear the voice of wonderful Sydney poet Candy Royalle, recorded before she tragically passed away from cancer in late June this year, aged only 37. We also heard one of a couple of appearances from Indigenous Australian poet Ali Cobby Eckermann.
Joni Void - Observer (Natalie's Song) feat. Natalie Reid [Constellation]
Joni Void - Disassociation (Kyla's Song) feat. Kyla Brooks/Nag [Constellation]
Joni Void - Empathy (Ayuko's Song) feat. Ayuko Gota/Noah] [Constellation]
Jean Cousin's music as Joni Void (and previously Johnny_Ripper) is an unusual fit for Monréal label Constellation, home of Godspeed and A Silver Mt Zion, who've tended to be analogue purists - but the shunning of digital recording & production techniques is long gone (there's plenty of glitch in some of Do Make Say Think's back catalogue for instance) and Cousin is from Montréal. I missed this album when it came out a bit over a year ago, but it's pretty brilliant, with tracks built from unusual sample sources and a few guest vocalists (in fact Kyla's Song above is entirely sourced from Kyla Brooks' voice) - there's a gloomy affect to most of the tracks, and a slightly different take on reflection and evocation through sampling than the usual vaporwave fare.
Michael Price - To Begin (Akira Kosemura Rework) [1631 Recordings]
We finish with another selection from the Diary Reworks of English composer Michael Price, released on 1631 Recordings. Here we have the gorgeous glitchy piano and strings of Akira Kosemura.
Listen again — ~193MB
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