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vinyl -- selection NOVEMBER 2005 |
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| Artist: |
ES |
| Title: |
Sateenkaarisuudelma |
| Label: |
Kraak (BE) |
| Format: |
2X LP |
| Price: |
16,5 euro |
| Catalog #: |
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Serving as a fantastic precursor to our imminent stocking of the Fonal catalogue, this is the new vinyl only (!) album from Fonal boss Sami Sänpäkkilä, aka Es, and what an album it is. Already being championed by David Keenan in the Wire and multiple webzines, there is little I can say about this that hasn’t already been laid on in these glowing reports, but this is an album I am truly passionate about. The first thing you notice is just how damned gorgeous it looks, this is easily the sleeve of the year; and the gorgeous watercolour shown on the front of the sleeve in heavy textured card is complemented by similar paintings on each panel of the luxurious double vinyl package. The most important thing about ‘Sateenkaarisuudelma’, of course, is the music; which ranges from the breathy vocals/violins and guitar of side A’s title track and the uplifting saxophone drenched charm of ‘Harmonia, Rakkautta’ to the dense piano led ‘Pianokaari’ (which featured on the recent ‘Invisible Pyramid’ compilation, psych followers!). What I find so irresistible about Es is his ability to make what might at first seem like difficult music (Finnish psychedelia anyone?) sound so effortlessly engaging. There is a childlike loveliness and a breathless warmth to these recordings, a homely quality far removed from the pretentiousness often associated with Wire referenced emissions. I implore you, give this album a home; love it and cherish it, nourish it with your attention and you will reap the rewards for years to come. A stone cold, quiet classic. |
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| Artist: |
ONEIDA / PLASTIC CRIMEWAVE SOUND |
| Title: |
S/T |
| Label: |
JAGJAGUWAR |
| Format: |
LP |
| Price: |
14 euros |
| Catalog #: |
JAGBR001 |
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A vinyl-only new album split between Brooklyn heavyweights ONEIDA and PLASTIC CRIMEWAVE SOUND. Oneida deliver their “Psychedelic Maze,” a flurry of ukuleles, hexoleles, and homemade drums recorded during the wee hours during their Thank Your Parents sessions. PLASTIC CRIME SOUND’s “End of Cloud” was deemed a perfect counterpart, a fuzz-soaked drone-rock opus, and the epitaph of departed guitarist CAT CHOW, who lends space-vixen vocals to the fray. Studio fuckery, motorik drumming, blasts of electronics, rolling bass waves, and wig-flipping fried guitar duels, "End of Cloud" is guaranteed to cause devotional nirvana, or at least the rolling of multiple blunts. JAGJAGUWAR |
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| Artist: |
COLLEEN |
| Title: |
The golden Morning Breaks |
| Label: |
LEAF (UK) |
| Format: |
LP |
| Price: |
17 euros |
| Catalog #: |
BAY48LP |
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Cécile Schott's 2003 debut, Everyone Alive Wants Answers, was hypnotizing mix of sampled recordings, found sounds, and lullabies mined from the chaos of recordings never meant to be heard together. Schott delivers an equally stunning achievement of meditative beauty on her latest release; with nary a beat, The Golden Morning Breaks embraces, abandons, and prepares for the warm jets, swathing listeners in a sea of comfort through its simultaneous familiarity and distinctness. However, The Golden Morning Breaks was recorded live with acoustic instruments, some familiar (an earlier life in noise rock and pop bands was called back up to memory) and others learned for this recording.
With a strong knowledge of current rock and electronic music, Schott picked up on late 16th-Century lute songs by John Dowland (from whom the album takes its name), 17th-Century compositions for viola da gamba (an ancestor to the cello), 20th-Century composers, kora techniques of West Africa, and Indonesian folk and gamelan. Composing required a new approach-- through a process of building and shedding-- and even Schott could never have guessed what the final album would sound like; her intention was to find distinctive sound qualities in both everyday instruments, like guitars, and those rarely used, like her 19th century glass harmonicon, a delicate-sounding glass glockenspiel.
The Golden Morning Breaks contains recordings rife with ideas and emotion, songs without traditional beginnings and ends. Rather, what makes the album so special is Schott's intuitive ability to create beauty through simplicity. By avoiding the strict formal approach to writing and recording, Colleen keys into the more primal magical realism in the common every day.
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