Having already named the four projects falling outside normal 'release' boundaries that complete our list, we press on somewhat arse about face to present LMYE's Festive 33-1/3 in full. Clunky though it clearly is, our approach remains the same: two sets of 2018 releases (15 each) that meant especially much to us over the year, selected
independently with both sets limited to no more than one pick per artist/label.
Once overlaps have been horse-traded into a final 30, the list is supplemented with our additional quartet.
In all of this, our goal is always to spread recognition as far as possible: over
& above LMYE's desire to embrace - rather than limit - the
multiplicity of sounds & artists we love, this is an attempt to
acknowledge & respond to year-end lists'
inevitable partiality.
It's never comfortable to reflect on how different ours might look
on another day or in another mood, given every year's surfeit of compelling music..
Moreover, some labels' outstanding output forces unpalatable choices. Notable releases like Jana Winderen's Spring Bloom in the Marginal Ice Zone, Triac's Departure & M. Geddes Gengras's Light Pipe (all ineligible because of labelmate selections) are clearly still core parts of the year's best...
Note that a number of fine labels regrettably unrepresented here, such as ACR, Polar Seas & Schwebung, will feature in a follow-up piece on the year's key compilations.
As always, for a more inclusive picture of our listening please explore the monthly Lend Me Your Radio series on SoundCloud, al's Mixcloud & jl's Bandcamp (collection & wish list)...
Still clunky, still well intentioned: the formula for our annual Festive 33-1/3 is, once again, no more than one pick per artist/label by each of us.
We then augment the resulting list (two sets of 15 releases selected independently, meshed & supplemented when doubles necessitate a bit of horse-trading...). The addition comes from four further projects that fall outside the normal 'release' boundaries - bigger &/or more ambitious (in multiple media, for example), or unexpected collaborations.
The rationale remains to spread recognition as far as possible. Over & above LMYE's desire to embrace - rather than limit - the multiplicity of sounds & artists we love, this is an attempt to acknowledge & respond to year-end lists' inevitable partiality. How different ours & others' might look on another day or in another mood, given the vast amount of great music every year brings...
As previously, the striking quality of some labels' output forces unpalatable choices. Outstanding releases like Lawrence English's Cruel Optimism, Kassel Jaeger & Jim O'Rourke's Wakes On Cerulean, Robert Crouch's Sublunaror Marc Kate's As If We Were Never Here didn't make the cut here only because something else on their particularly strong imprints (Room40, Editions Mego, Touch & Dragon's Eye, respectively) meant even more to one of us. But in any broader sense they are clearly core parts of the year's best...
As always, for a more inclusive picture of our listening pleasures please check out the monthly Lend Me Your Radio series on SoundCloud, al's Mixcloud & jl's Bandcamp (collection & wish list).
Olli Aarni :: Nielu (Florabelle) Olivier Alary :: Pieces for Sine Wave Oscillators (Line) Anjou :: Epithymía (Kranky) Aquarelle :: Leave Corners (Debacle) ASC :: Trans-Neptunian Objects (Auxiliary)
Andrea Belfi / Taylor Deupree & Marcus Fischer / Masaya Ozaki & Kaito Nakahori - Alveare / Lowlands / Mythologies (Iikki) Benoît Pioulard :: Lignin Poise (Beacon Sound) Celer :: Plays Liberace (Celer) Dominic Coppola :: Golden Blonde Air (Boudoir) Dramavinile :: 7 (Unknown Tone)
drøne :: A Perfect Blind (Pomperipossa) Endurance :: Echoic Architecture (Polar Seas) / Molecular Shrine (ACR) Forest Management :: The Elevated Quiet (Constellation Tatsu) David Fyans :: Subscriber Series (Erstlaub)
IJO :: Melancholika Vol. 2 (ACR) The Inward Circles :: And Right Lines Limit and Close All Bodies (Corbel Stone Press) Hannu Karjalainen :: A Handful Of Dust Is A Desert (Karaoke Kalk) Steven Kemner :: Gradation Movements (Fluid Audio) Moon Zero :: Relationships Between Inner and Outer Space (Denovali)
poemme :: Soft Ice (Polar Seas) the prairie lines :: eyes down slowdown (Whitelabrecs) Steve Roach :: Nostalgia for the Future (Timeroom) Claire M. Singer :: Fairge (Touch) Sontag Shogun & Moskitoo :: The Things We Let Fall Apart / The Thunderswan (Home Normal)
Thet Liturgiske Owäsendet :: Hafvet (Low Point) The Transcendence Orchestra :: Modern Methods for Ancient Rituals (Editions Mego) Various Artists/Jon Wozencroft :: Movements (Touch) Velleitie :: Scheming the Afterimage with God Herself (Sounds Against Humanity)
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
Ineptitude or high-mindedness? Either way (both, really), LMYE's Festive 33-1/3 - a selection of the releases that meant most to us in 2016 - again emerges on the last day of the year... The song remains the same too: a clunky but sincere attempt to acknowledge how much more great music was released over the year, even just in our narrow corner of endeavour, than an inevitably partial list like this can begin to embrace. To spread the love as far as possible the two of us select 15 releases each, but no more than one per label or artist. After a bit of jostling & horse-trading over duplicates (though barely any this year, when we've evidently been further apart in our listening than previously...), we supplement the 30 with four projects that fall outside the normal 'release' boundaries - bigger &/or more ambitious (in multiple media, for example), or not strictly new - to derive our 33-1/3.
This year's list has been unusually challenging since a number of key labels were in overdrive. Grand projects have multiplied too. So our self-constraining methodology became even more masochistic. How, to take an especially painful example, to choose between Bethan Kellough's Aven & Claire M. Singer's Solas? Two exceptional releases that each expanded notions of sound palettes & what could be done with them, but both on Touch (about whom more shortly...). & that's to exclude Yann Novak's Ornamentation, Simon Scott's Floodlines, Anna von Hauswolff'sKallan (Prototype)& Fennesz's Mahler Remix, despite all four clearly demanding recognitition as part of the year's 'best'. Ditto conflicts between multiple pieces of outstanding work on Dragon's Eye, Editions Mego, Line, Room40, Sonic Pieces & Students of Decay - to highlight the concerns of only one pair of LMYE ears. Note to self: a follow-up without the hair shirt may be needed to honour all these exclusions.
At the very least, for a less partial picture of our listening priorities please check out the monthly Lend Me Your Radio series on SoundCloud, al's Mixcloud & jl's Bandcamp (collection & wish list).
2016 Festive 33-1/3: Jeremy Bible - Music for Black Holes (Aole) [jl] Dirty Hope/Graham Dunning/David Fyans/Mark Lyken/Orphax/TVO/Arne Weinberg - li series (Broken20) [jl] Stephan Mathieu - Radiance series (Schwebung) [jl] Abul Mogard - Works (Ecstatic) [al]
1991 - No More Dreams (No More Dreams) [al] Chris Abrahams - Climb (Vegetable) [jl] anthéne - Black Carbon (Assembly Field) [jl] Beautumn - Bordeaux (Infraction) [al] Benoît Pioulard - Thine / Radial (self-released) [al] Bruised Skies - Guide (Blank Editions) [al] Celestino - Beyond Enemy (A Guide To Saints) [al] Dominic Coppola - Ladylike EP (Overview Ltd.) [al]
drøne - reversing into the future (Pomperipossa) [jl] Drottning Omma - Iris av is (offworldcolonies ltd.) [al] Christian Fennesz & Jim O'Rourke - It's Hard For Me To Say I’m Sorry (Editions Mego) [jl] Francesco Giannico & Giulio Aldinucci - Agoraphonia (Dronarivm) [jl] Billy Gomberg - Slight at that Contact (Students of Decay) [jl] Tobias Hellkvist - Vesterhavet (self-released) [jl] Chris Herbert - Katushki (Low Point) [jl]
Braeyden Jae - Fog Mirror (Whited Sepulchre) [al] KETEV - I Know No Weekend (Portals Editions) [al] Bethan Kellough - Aven (Touch) [jl] L’eoscombu Couti - Five Cambridge Utilities (Constellation Tatsu) [al] Sophia Loizou - Singulacra (Kathexis) [al] Sana Obruent - Prince of the Air (Blackjack Illuminist) [al] Marsen Jules - Shadows in Time (Oktaf) [jl] Moss Covered Technology - Speicherbank (Eilean) [al]
New Rome - Nowhere (Room40) [al] Nils Quak - Ad Interim (Phinery) [jl] Alex Smalley - JAN SBR 15 (Rural Colours) [jl] The Swifter - Wall Sailor (Sonic Pieces) [jl] Triac - Here (Line) [jl] Willamette - Diminished Composition (Scissor Tail) [al] Uwe Zahn/Porya Hatami/Darren McClure - Veerian (Eilean) [jl]
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
It's hardly a surprise from the home of Cosi, Ielasi,Orsi & Ratti, of course. But so much ravishing music emerged there in 2016 that if we were indifferent enough to the category's absurdity Italy would surely be LMYE's Country of the Year... As our Festive 33-1/3 - out tomorrow, allegedly - will show, some of the 2016 releases that mattered most to these ears are by Italian artists. A number of those that fell victim to our hair-shirted methodology (only one release per label/artist) are too. This, ahem, renaissance embraces a host of styles - from post-rock to ultra-minimalism. Given that, is there anything distinctively Italian threading them together beyond nationality? Perhaps. Many of the artists below manifest notable care & restraint over their sounds - a commitment to selection & balance that seems rooted in the country's broader culture. Che figata!
Bonus:
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
So endlessly creative & so relentlessly collaborative are Jan & Romke Kleefstra that it's disconcerting to find that LMYE's favourite Friesians have gone over a year without a formal release. But the hiatus is over, thankfully. A trio of new & imminent albums starts with the long-gestated first offering of their venerable Tsjinlûd collective - a book ('full colour hard cover, with black & white contents, containing photography, drawings, paintings and poetry by all seven Tsjinlûd-members') & CD package. Mixed, edited & graphic designed by the great Machinefabriek - the Kleefstras' partner in Piiptsjilling- it is freighted with their characteristic drowsy, somehow ceremonial atmosphere but takes on a chattering, hall of mirrors quality through the collective's salty suite of North Sea voices. In addition, the brothers' trio with fellow Tsjinlûddite Anne Chris Bakker has new cassettes due soon on both Low Point (previously responsible for KBK's lovely Griis) & Tombed Visions. A richly, darkly droning instalment of the former - some of which was previously on Ambientblog.net's 10th anniversary collection a year ago - emerged yesterday...
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
Managed to miss a couple of earlier tip-offs, so the first taste of new Chris Herbert isn't so much a tease as a disconcerting delight. Disconcerting because of its warp-speed arrival after the, er, pause between Mezzotint & Constants (part of LMYE's 2014 Festive 33-1/3) - two of the most beguiling releases in these ears' acquaintance. & a delight because:
Enveloping organ swells cut through with both introspective switch-backs & soaring, sky-rending moments - as Room40 brilliantly terms it, Herbert again "blends the momentary blooming of rich structures with greyscale microclimates"... Oh, & it's a tape. On the always admirable Low Point... Stylistically-related bonus: "A collage of material that didn't make the cut for the second album for various reasons: germinal ideas, failed experiments, technical insurrection. In the grand tradition of the freedom of b-sides, some of it is worthwhile, if unpolished. Many of these audio swatches exist as longer stand-alone tracks that may surface at some point."
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
* Profile includes an illuminating interview with Hardwickthat explores Low Point's "logical progression", as well as vinyl love & label challenges...
Blurb: "Employing the same minimal palette of guitar and field recordings but now drawing upon urban, rather than coastal themes; Two Songs is iron, brick and dark asphalt in response to the grey-blue swell and salt wind of Of the Sea and Shore. Side A is built around a buzzing drone, an arc light on concrete, which by degrees dissolves to an autumnal hiss; that low, constant mixture of rain, distant traffic and human life which sits just below the threshold of consciousness for anyone living in a city framed by spare, untreated guitar. The same drone, now dulled and ragged, reappears on Side B as a coda to a gently oscillating wash of interwoven harmonics. Small shifts in texture, timbre and dynamics are concisely entwined to create an atmospheric and evocative EP."
(from sound&fury comp Tomorrow & Tomorrow & Tomorrow, Vol. 1) Photos by Abbey Rees-Hales. Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
p jørgensen'sthird Low Point is - please brace for the obligatory intro clunk - a new high point. Like recent work from Cory Allen (covered here earlier this year), it captures an artist in rapid, thrillingly ambitious transition from their original largely digital, controlled sound into a broader electro-acoustic palette foregrounding 'real' instruments/textures & improvisation.
LP's characterisation of the piece as melancholy & intricate is pretty unarguable. The ravishing Capetillo cover captures its refracting beauty perfectly - a kind of rippling deep stasis that leaves these ears frantic to hear where the long arc of Peter's development goes next...
Artist/label blurbs: "this album has been a long time coming, as i initially started composing the opening and closing tracks back in late 2010 while touring the uk. this vinyl release features beautiful contributions from christoph berg on strings, jeppe skjold on reeds & anders provis on drums & cymbals. cover photography by acclaimed photographer christina capetillo. linernotes & coverdesign by architect & director morten meldgaard. mastered for vinyl by taylor deupree."
"Gold Beach was painstakingly recorded, processed and assembled over the course of the last four years.
Unlike Jørgensen's previous works, electro-acoustic compositions subject to heavy computer processing, the most notable departure on Gold Beach is the prominent use of unprocessed acoustic instruments, including double bass, violin, clarinet and saxophone.
The framework to Gold Beach was created by Jørgensen and his group of musicians carrying out a series of both structured and improvised sessions, which were then subject to additional recording, editing and further composition. Whilst some sessions stand more or less untouched from their first takes, others were subject to heavy editing, though the feeling of instant composition is maintained throughout."
Full stream:
Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.
