'Psychedelic minimalism' indeed. Cory Allen's journey beyond the exquisite electro-pointillism that made him a natural sparring partner for the great Steinbruechel (on Seams, an entrant in LMYE's Festive 50 a couple of years back...) takes him ever further into novel territory that seems to need some name of its own - preferably one less dreary than the utilitarian 'electro-acoustic improvisation'. So PM it is... "As the perfection of the digital age continues to tighten its grip on the organic quality of analog, I felt a need to gently take a few steps back from the stringent digital world in order to find balance. Sometime over the last two years, my interest shifted to the subtleties of the analog bandwidth, and more specifically, the artifacts or errors that occur in the analog medium as a source,"he wrote (for Fluid Radio) a while back. (Allen's successful pursuit of the "beauty of degraded analog sources" - sourced from "bad cable grounding signals, poor antenna connections, shoddy field recordings and blank spots on aged vinyl records" - is displayed in the lovely blur of his Shutter Echo below...). Already signalled by last year's gripping 'ensemble drone' workout The Great Order (again a Festive 50 component, at the turn of this year), Allen's move to an acoustic aesthetic stands out as a striking, unexpected re-invention. Now it underpins two forthcoming releases that seem likely to count among the year's most cherished by these ears - The Source & The Seeker and The Healer, the latter a collaboration with another member of the LMYE pantheon, Duane Pitre, that adds yet more lustre to the increasingly essential Students of Decay. (In his Feel Free, ED09 & other works, Pitre too has happily married an experimental approach with an acoustic ensemble setting, of course.) As well as PM, Allen tags Source's almost Tantrically prolongedDivine Waves (hear below) as 'cello bass meditation'. A spacious meditativeness may well be what connects his early & later work. It's also much in evidence on the keeningly resonant TS&TH, meanwhile, which unveils & showcases Allen's self-invented 49-string drone harp - not quite Ellen Fullman's Long String Instrument, but not far off. "With these works, my intent is to find a balance between the living nature of analog and the magic perfection of digital, all the while imprinting the most fundamental aesthetic of all; the human spirit."
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
Having unveiled our 2012 picks characteristically late in the day, here's an anticipatory 'Best of' for the new year to jump the gun on next December's list frenzy - & even provide some kind of benchmark for our eventual contribution. The list is unencumbered by the restrictions - no more than one pick per artist/label - imposed on the recent Furtive 30... This initial selection of some 20 coming highlights ranges from Stephan Mathieu's ravishing David Sylvian remix album, Wandermuede, which is already out as a download & has an imminent formal release, as does his Un Coeur Simple, to more speculative ones. They also include long-awaited pieces such as Aurora Liminalis from William Basinski & Richard Chartier onLINE - the pair's first since their Untitled series was expanded in 2008 (having begun in 2004).
This 'pined-for' category also features Chris Herbert's Constants (label unannounced), which will end an absence even longer on some measures - since Mezzotint in 2006. Nor has there been a full release from Mark Templeton to savour since 2009.
Several works in progress will add further lustre to 2013 if/when they surface. These include a new solo album from Steinbruechel & an epic remix/re-interpretation/e-book project for Kenneth Kirschner (involving Steinbruechel, incidentally...) Also factored in: prospective debuts from two drone collaborations, Andere (Anduin & Radere) & A pond waiting for you to leap (Le Berger & Pascal Savy). The latter may still be some way off (though, happily, Sam Le Berger threatens "much more music" this year in any case).
NB: obviously enough, this year will bring many more great releases than those highlighted here. Many outstanding artists & labels are unrepresented here. Please let us know what else these ears should be anticipating...
Andere - s/t (label unknown) A pond begging you to leap - title unknown (label unknown) Chris Abrahams - title unknown(Room 40) Chris Herbert - Constants (label unannounced) Cory Allen - The Great Order (Quiet Design) David Sylvian/Stephen Mathieu - Wandermuede (samadhisound) Duane Pitre - Bridges (Important) Kenneth Kirschner - remix album/e-book (Tokafi) Lawrence English - Lonely Women's Club (Important)
Mark Templeton - Jealous Heart (Under The Spire) Mountains - Centralia (Thrill Jockey) Philip Jeck - title unknown (Touch; also Rosy Parlane/Sohrab 7"s) Steinbruechel - title unknown (label unknown) Stephan Mathieu - Un Coeur Simple (Baskaru) Tashi Wada & Stephan Mathieu - Revenant (Schwebung) Taylor Deupree & Ryuichi Sakamoto/Taylor Deupree & Stephen Vitiello - titles unknown (12k) William Basinski - Nocturnes (2062)/Aurora Liminalis (with Richard Chartier,LINE) Yann Novak - Blue.Hour (Farmacia901)/Undefined(with Richard Chartier, Farmacia901)
NB: top photo by Taylor Deupree. Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
2012 brought many more great releases than 30, obviously. But after some increasingly expansive Festive 50s LMYE has embraced the austerity of the times. This year each co-author was confined to a more modest 15 picks, with no more than one going to any artist or any label & no smuggled expansion by throwing in multiple releases from the same name.
Although these constraints could - & did - still accommodate two choices from the same stable across the co-authorial divide (policed by a strict Chinese wall, naturally...), they ended up regrettably harsh on some outstanding music - like Below Sea Level, Portraits, Secret Photographsor Superstorms. All might well have bludgeoned their way into these ears' top 15 if the rules hadn't restricted 12k, Important & Experimedia to a single release each. The same goes for LINE, Low Point & Touch's output, incidentally.
Similarly, even allocating his ravishing David Sylvian remix album Wandermude (out next month, but downloadable now...) to next year's list, a case could credibly have been made for including several Stephan Mathieu pieces. With the possible exceptions of Jefre Cantu-Ledesmaand (as The Liminal point out, ditto Marc Masters)Oren Ambarchi,it's challenging to think of an artist who had a more impressive year - though each of Kane Ikin's releases also resonated powerfully with us.
Still, accepting that all such lists are a bit arbitrary, our goal was to distribute recognition as widely as possible. We'll anyway be back soon(-ish) with a more capacious supplementary list to try to capture everything else that stood out over the year.
For now, though, & subject to the restrictions rehearsed above, these are 30 releases that particularly mattered to us in 2012. Each co-author is identified with their 15 picks, though note that both of us nominated Already Gone, I'll Make You Quiet, Novaya Zemlya &Radioland [Panoramica] originally...
Two alluring, affecting new-ish collaborations - with Steinbruechel (Seam) & Marcus Fischer (Two / Twenty-Two) - add further lustre toCory Allen's lovely body of work. While both exhibit what Marc Weidenbaum (Disquiet) nicely terms "gentle sonic psychedelics that bring texture to what might otherwise be termed ambient" (in his predictably insightful reflections around Two / Twenty-Two: see below), Seam is distinctive for its happy marriage of intensely detailed, almost gritty microsound with a huge bass rumble. Two / Twenty-Two, in contrast, deploys a larger, messier palette (twangs & groans, even...) to shape a more urgent, more 'narrative' sound - especially in the second part, Seventy-Seven.
A fair few Allen streams here. Several albums on Spotify too...
Blurb: "Fourteen months and countless folders of audio files later, Steinbrüchel and Cory Allen offer their first collaborative album entitled «Seam». An intensive and process driven work period resulted in an album that integrates the two artist's individual soundworlds. Each sound was processed and multiplied by both artists, forming a sound archive of individual threads. The compositions were then sewn and stitched together using the collection of the archive. Connecting each composition is an inbetween thread which weaves the album's tracks together.
The «- -- - --» audio process was extended into the design and production of the physical packaging. The cover design is based on a system which reflects the track order and the artists' contributions to the creation of the compositions."
Way beyond blurb (Marc Weidenbaum, Disquiet): "The Internet is a congruity engine. The ceaseless churn of online databases aligns any two or more things found to have in common any one thing. Cities with similar names require clarification from mapping systems. Faces of people with similar names appear together in image searches, forcibly conflated into one extended family.
Congruity is especially powerful regarding individuals with the same birthday. Factors such as seasonal attributes and development relative to classmates are widely accepted to explain perceived similarities between individuals otherwise born years, even centuries, apart.
Two / Twenty Two by Cory Allen and Marcus Fischer occurred because the two musicians acted on their shared February 22 birthday. Both live in cities considered artistic outposts in otherwise rustic states (Allen: Austin, Texas; Fischer: Portland, Oregon), both have professional experience in visual design, and both explore gentle sonic psychedelics that bring texture to what might otherwise be termed ambient. All coincidence, certainly. Allen and Fischer stacked the deck in congruity’s favor by providing each other with a set of samples from which to devise new music. The result is two rough fragile recordings. They have the burnish of delicate objects that survived significant tumult. As for the tremulous piano in track two, perhaps it’s a nod to Chopin, who was, according to various databases tracking such things, also born on February 22."
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
Two alluring, affecting new-ish collaborations - with Steinbruechel (Seam) & Marcus Fischer (Two / Twenty-Two) - add further lustre toCory Allen's lovely body of work. While both exhibit what Marc Weidenbaum (Disquiet) nicely terms "gentle sonic psychedelics that bring texture to what might otherwise be termed ambient" (in his predictably insightful reflections around Two / Twenty-Two: see below), Seam is distinctive for its happy marriage of intensely detailed, almost gritty microsound with a huge bass rumble. Two / Twenty-Two, in contrast, deploys a larger, messier palette (twangs & groans, even...) to shape a more urgent, more 'narrative' sound - especially in the second part, Seventy-Seven.
A fair few Allen streams here. Several albums on Spotify too...
Blurb: "Fourteen months and countless folders of audio files later, Steinbrüchel and Cory Allen offer their first collaborative album entitled «Seam». An intensive and process driven work period resulted in an album that integrates the two artist's individual soundworlds. Each sound was processed and multiplied by both artists, forming a sound archive of individual threads. The compositions were then sewn and stitched together using the collection of the archive. Connecting each composition is an inbetween thread which weaves the album's tracks together.
The «- -- - --» audio process was extended into the design and production of the physical packaging. The cover design is based on a system which reflects the track order and the artists' contributions to the creation of the compositions."
Way beyond blurb (Marc Weidenbaum, Disquiet): "The Internet is a congruity engine. The ceaseless churn of online databases aligns any two or more things found to have in common any one thing. Cities with similar names require clarification from mapping systems. Faces of people with similar names appear together in image searches, forcibly conflated into one extended family.
Congruity is especially powerful regarding individuals with the same birthday. Factors such as seasonal attributes and development relative to classmates are widely accepted to explain perceived similarities between individuals otherwise born years, even centuries, apart.
Two / Twenty Two by Cory Allen and Marcus Fischer occurred because the two musicians acted on their shared February 22 birthday. Both live in cities considered artistic outposts in otherwise rustic states (Allen: Austin, Texas; Fischer: Portland, Oregon), both have professional experience in visual design, and both explore gentle sonic psychedelics that bring texture to what might otherwise be termed ambient. All coincidence, certainly. Allen and Fischer stacked the deck in congruity’s favor by providing each other with a set of samples from which to devise new music. The result is two rough fragile recordings. They have the burnish of delicate objects that survived significant tumult. As for the tremulous piano in track two, perhaps it’s a nod to Chopin, who was, according to various databases tracking such things, also born on February 22."
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
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