Proud of Stroud

Stephan Mathieu & TSU (Robert Curgenven & Joerg Maria Zeger) bring searching, rich sonic explorations to the improbable setting of Stroud on Friday week. Courtesy of SVA, a corner of Gloucestershire more associated with Blurt & Pendragon will be hosting one of the year's must-hears - Mathieu wielding an 1896 zither to deliver his towering Music for Columbia Phonoharp ("a dedication to the gospel preacher Washington Phillips"), TSU constructing daunting new slabs of austere beauty & no doubt deconstructing them on the spot.

Hope to see you there...

Below hear much recent Mathieu & the first TSU recording (from Curgenven's immense Oltre). Also hear Curgenven's extraordinary, every which way Glenn Miller to Tim Hecker mix for Serein, Leaving Solaris (Manufacturing Nostalgia).

Mix note: "...not just the physical journey across the cinematic planet, away from its nostalgic mirages of the past and back into Space - which is at once from where we came and also the new way forward - it is also the psychological passage which marks the release which is both to leave and to create the departure. In this process, much as with the manufacturing of nostalgia, we have the beginnings of not just an escape from ourselves, but a modern era epic which trawls the cinematic histories of the 20th century; where through rose-tinged lenses, the crackle, the wash of decay and the textured fading of its print can present us with a new Present encased in the old and incapable of harming us for fear of dispelling its own apparition."

Discogs: SM / RC / JMZ

Spotify: SM / RC

Previous coverage.

Stephan Mathieu - a static place (album preview) [via experimedia]

Stephan Mathieu - minuet (excerpts) [via pdis_inpartmaint]

Stephan Mathieu - schwarzschild radius (excerpts) [via pdis_inpartmaint]

Stephan Mathieu - remain (exerpts) [via pdis_inpartmaint]

Recorded_Fields (Robert Curgenven) - Largo capriccioso (extract)

NB: photo above by Ary Kaplan Nakamura for Panoramica.

Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.

Can't Buy Me Lull

No expense necessary for The Inventors of Aircraft's Lull, its 3 tracks of fine-grained ambience another eloquent exhibit in the case for the quality of free netlabel releases (see those from Saffron Slumber previously on LMYE here). Airy and inventive craftsman Phil Tomsett’s latest (on young Harry Towell’s reliably tasty Audio Gourmet) is the third excellent release in his TIOA project - all freebies - following on last year's As It Is (Resting Bell) and 2008 debut Unknown Language on the now defunct Serein. Lull is, we're told, 'themed around the sea,' but up here at Earslend Mansions we like to be free too! Free, that is, to hang our own signifieds on these floaty-drifty signifiers. No bones to pick, just that all that programme stuff butters no parsnips with us - and, anyway, what matters surely is that this is one of the finest 15-minute lulls around right now.







Lull was recorded during what turned out to be some fairly intense sessions in Phil's studio between December ’10 and January ’11. Label says: “Through these sessions, around 15 pieces of music were collated at various states of completion and it then became an issue as to which he would choose to fit the bill for a fifteen minute Audio Gourmet EP. Throughout the recording process, Phil became unintentionally aware of some kind of sea voyage theme, with flickering imagery of giant ships hauling themselves away from the quayside and powering through the water running through his imagination. When the sessions were complete and the time came to chose the final three tracks for the EP, the sea voyage theme had remained. This prompted the overiding nautical theme to be written into the track titles and the cover artwork too.”

Oh aye, and it’s partly down to Ian Hawgood’s mastering prowess that Lull is so well turned out, as it was on As It Is.



Hear Resting Bell yell: ““As it is” has an enormous warm and dense sound. You’ll find some elements you know from “Unknown Language” like the repetitive melodic motifs over the foundation of droning, growling sounds. But for me “As it is” also sounds like a massive step forward. And massive is the keyword: The sound is one of the thickest and richest things I’ve heard for a while. When I listen to the pieces the best comparison coming to my mind is the black monolith from “2001: A Space Odyssey”. Or the fantastic sound-design from Danny Boyles “Sunshine”. It sounds like something really elemental and physical. And so it is hard to point out one special track or part. The drones and melodies are moving slowly as one organic flood of magma, crawling further and further. And on top you have little scratches and crackles, shimmering and reflecting like the sunlight.””

The Inventors of Aircraft - The Tower by Resting Bell



Get sorted with a full set of Tomsett by grabbing previous release, Unknown Language.

Sample some below:







Important: LMYE only makes music available that artists/labels have chosen to share freely. Let us know if something here shouldn't be.