this mess is mine - weekend ep

.:: "This Mess is Mine" is a solo project of Lars Kranholdt. His "The Weekend EP"- release presents a little piece of electronica, which has been created within a weekend in March 2006. The six tracks of "The Weekend EP" tell an autobiographical story from searching and finding ones inner calmness. "This Mess Is Mine" combines stumbling beats, soft guitars and Rhodes melodies with a ticktacking fanorgan.

download: this mess is mine - weekend ep


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get him eat him - arms down

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.:: Classic rock guitars and Hammond organ intermingle with harmonized vocoder, booming bass and drums, and a jubilant horn section in a unique, powerful and emotionally resonant call to arms. So begins Arms Down, the second full-length album from Providence, RI's Get Him Eat Him. Get Him Eat Him's 2005 debut album Geography Cones was about the precarious maintenance of a social mask-- drinking coffee, going to parties, picking out clothes for a first date. Arms Down is an exploration of what happens when that mask is dropped.

The cultivated jitters of Geography Cones have given way to uncontrolled spasms - the careening thrusts of "Push and Pull," the swaggering stomp of "Present Tenses," the crushing self-doubt and soaring self-realization of "Murphy Bed." A rich, consistent and multi-layered record, Arms Down hits with stunning range and force. It's no accident that Arms Down is so confident and well-honed; Get Him Eat Him has been working on this album since before the release of Geography Cones.

For nearly two years, the band has been writing and recording songs for limited edition tour EPs, tracing out the contours of their new material with thrift store four tracks, second-hand microphones, and cheap software effects. Meanwhile, three national tours (including dates with The Constantines, Xiu Xiu, Oxford Collapse, Ted Leo, Broken Social Scene and The Arcade Fire) brought the band closer together as musicians, giving them ample opportunity to grow into a forceful and cohesive unit.

By the time they began recording Arms Down in July of 2006, the band knew how they wanted these songs to sound. To help them realize this complex and far-reaching vision, Get Him Eat Him enlisted former Dismemberment Plan guitarist Jason Caddell to co-produce the record. Caddell guided the recording process through multiple locations and engineers, including a stint at Brooklyn's Studio G with Joel Hamilton (Sparklehorse, Tom Waits, Elvis Costello), a few days at the Wrens' New Jersey home, and a handful of sessions at DC's famed Inner Ear Studio engineered by Caddell himself.

Arms Down was mixed at DC's Silver Sonya by Chad Clark (Fugazi, Smart Went Crazy) and TJ Lipple (Aloha, Wilderness), and by frontman Matt LeMay on his home computer. The resulting album is a striking combination of homespun detail and hi-fi punch. Musically, Arms Down is no less sophisticated. Seeking to match each musical idea to its ideal sound, Get Him Eat Him expanded their sonic palate with horns from Beirut's Zach Condon and Jon Natchez, strings from Beirut's Kristin Ferebee and veteran cellist Amy Domingues, 12-string guitar from the Wrens' Charles Bissell, and Hammond organ from New York-based jazz keyboardist (and occasional Broken Social Scene collaborator) Chris Brown.

The band's own playing has grown more nuanced and focused, pushing the expressive range of each instrument to fit their increasingly intricate and dynamic material. Like its predecessor, Arms Down deftly and uniquely balances the synthetic and the organic, leaving some of its most jarring moments (the harrowing end of "What We Do") to cellos and trumpets, and its most beautiful moments (the aching crescendo of "Just So") to synthesizers and vocoders. In many ways, Arms Down can be best understood as the product of a band living, touring, and playing together in the iPod age; Ted Leo, Archers of Loaf, Chavez, Al Green, Bruce Springsteen, Mouse on Mars and Brainiac, all put on shuffle and reinterpreted through the hearts, minds and hands of five young music obsessives.

.:: Two years after the release of their debut album, Geography Cones, Get Him Eat Him is back with Arms Down, a unique, powerful and emotionally resonant record. After touring extensively through 2005 and 2006 with the likes of Xiu Xiu, The Constantines, Ted Leo, and The Arcade Fire, Get Him Eat Him settled down in July of 06' to begin recording the new album.

Co-produced by Jason Caddell, the album was recorded over multiple sessions at Brooklyn's Studio G, DC's famous Inner Ear Studio, and at the homes of both The Wrens'Charles Bissell and Get Him Eat Him's Matt LeMay. The result is a rich, multi-layered album comprised of the perfect mixture of synthetic and organic sound. Some of the album's most striking moments come through thanks to collaborations with other artists, including Zach Condon and veteran cellist Amy Domingues. But at its beautiful, weird core, Arms Down is all about the dedication and obsession of the members of Get Him Eat Him.

The sounds and ideas here are truly representative of a group of people steeped in the ipod age; constantly immersed in touring, playing together, and letting the diverse ideas of Ted Leo, Al Green, Bruce Springsteen, Chavez, and Mouse on Mars stream through their consciousness and flow into place on their own album.

*** listen "exposure", awesome guitar and keys work ***

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someone still loves you boris yeltsin - broom

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.:: Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin, a band, couldn’t list a single music blog until their lo-fi MP3s and low-res JPEGs made them worldwide icons of Blogdom in 2005. Their debut record, Broom is an expertly crafted indie pop gem. Spin magazine read an SSLYBY blog, downloaded their music and declared the Missouri band “could succeed The Shins.” Then a slew of bloggers ranked them ahead of Wilco and Iron & Wine in Leafblower’s annual “Top Bands of America Today”.

“Internet fame doesn’t make sense to us,” says drummer and main songwriter Philip Dickey. “I don’t think our lead singer has an e-mail address.”

All members were babies in the early 80s. A mutual ex-girlfriend from high school introduced the original members of the band. And that’s also where the name comes from—high school. “I thought of it when I was at the mall with my mom,” Dickey says. “We’re not good at naming things or planning ahead. We only tried to make people like us a couple years ago.”

SSLYBY’s hometown used to be a beacon of pop music in the 50’s. That’s when The Ozark Jubilee was broadcasting live country music from the downtown Springfield, entertaining millions of viewers every Saturday night on primetime NBC. “We think about that show a lot,” Dickey says. “Our little town was the third highest origination point for national television…third only to New York and Hollywood. We want to bring the spotlight back here. Moving to Brooklyn or LA would be copping out. We’re not that sad about living in Missouri.”

The band released their debut album, Broom, originally in March 2005. Broom was recorded in an attic and a living room on Weller Street, Knauer’s home. The band’s ambition was simple- to make the “Local Releases” bin at CD Warehouse. However, it turned into a classic rock ‘n’ roll record: the kind where pop perfectionism meets studio experimentations and each track flows effortlessly. Relatively tame pop songs are molded by happy accidents of fate, sometimes involving unexplained swarming sounds and doubled drums tracks.

The band posted Broom MP3s on their website, and that’s how the blogging boom began. Then the San Francisco Weekly wrote a love letter to the band—literally.

“Dear Unknown Band from Middle of Nowhere Missouri, How do I love thee? …your debut is one of those rare albums where every song is crafted, delicious, and essential. This is disgusting, really, given the fact that the oldest member of your band is only 22. Yours truly, Chris Baty”

And the infatuation hasn’t ended. It’s impossible to find a reviewer or blogger that isn’t lovesick over Broom, even with omniscient help of Google.

The band is in the process of following up Broom at incessant pace. Each month SSLYBY releases 30 minutes of analog recordings to subscribers of their prolific “Tape Club”. And they proved they were a real band when they toured with Secretly Canadian’s Catfish Haven in February. The Columbia Tribune called it one of the best shows of the year….“Springfield up-and-comer doesn’t yet realize the gifts it possesses - a scary thought.”

Also scary: the reviews barely scratch the surface of SSLYBY’s virtues. Listen to what Pitchfork labeled the “Basement MP3’s”. Scour the internet. Feel the love poured into each song. And watch Google completely debase the way we discover our new favorite bands.


download: someone still loves you boris yeltsin - broom


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the octopus project - one ten hundred thousand million

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.:: This instrumental space-dance quartet won a spot on the bill at the upcoming Coachella festival after a fan entered the group in a MySpace contest, unbeknownst to the band. The Octopus Project's set was a preview of how they'll light up the California desert: sci-fi-flick synthesizer squeals, power-riff guitars, hellbent drumming. In one song, Yvonne Lambert coaxed playful squiggles and dying sighs from the antennae-like extension of a theremin, waving her hands in the air like code as guitars rang like church bells around her -- as if it were an outtake of the Beach Boys' "Good Vibrations" with Mogwai as the studio band.

.:: I hope -- I think -- we've finally made it past the era of electronica-as-genre. During the '90s, how many dissimilar artists were corralled under this ridiculous blanket label in the name of the Next Big Trend? At the end of the last decade, you couldn't throw a sample or synth line into a song without being accused of jumping on the electronica bandwagon. Even supposedly do-no-wrong artists like Radiohead and U2 were lambasted by fans for hinging entire records on electronic experimentation. Perhaps this is why, despite all the brouhaha surrounding the "movement", many mainstream practitioners of electronic music were unimaginative and derivative of the "genre" forerunners.

But yes, thankfully the eggshell tip-toeing that hindered the potential of our technology seems to have waned. A song can finally be judged by the complete picture on the puzzle rather than by the shape of one of its pieces. From an instrumentation point of view, the jump from Kylie Minogue to The Postal Service really isn't that huge, but we're not going to see them on tour together (except in my dreams).

And as genre lines blur, bend, and break in the digital age, artists are no longer afraid to push the boundaries of what we've heard before. This of course doesn't make my job any easier. How does one categorize The Octopus Project, for instance? One Ten Hundred Thousand Million, the second release from this Austin instrumental trio (with the help of an assortment of guest musician friends), is an everything-and-the-kitchen-sink concoction of various acoustic instruments, keyboards, digital effects, and samples. At its most effective, the production is so seamless that it's almost difficult to discern the live instrumentation from the loops. Is The Octopus Project a symbiosis of man and machine, or does it exist in some fluid limbo in between?

The record alternates between high energy drum-n-bass grooves and slower cuts of subdued moodiness. Throughout, however, there is a sense of urgent unease. Every beat is purposeful, tight, and determined. When listening, I can't help feeling that there is some task that I have yet to accomplish, and that time is running out for me. I think this is due in large part to drummer Toto Miranda, who rips out dance beats so quickly that you can see why most DJs stick to sampling. The irony is that with a DJ, you get the impression of the calm and collected Wizard of Oz, pulling the strings behind the scenes -- always in complete control. The image of a live drummer, however, is one of exhausting work and flailing arms. Even though the drummer technically has more control over tempo than a DJ, it's he who resembles the slave to rhythm.

This is most evident than on boisterous opener "Exit Counselor", where Miranda lays down a furious beat, booming and fuzzy, while an amalgam of staccato jangles, echoes, phase-effect keyboards, and guitar noise breakdowns create a thick landscape of sound. This and other upbeat tracks, such as "Music is Happiness" and "Tuxedo Hat", are the quickest to please.

The real heart and soul of this record, however, exists in the quieter moments, when the noise and effects are pushed to the background, allowing a simple hook or bass line to establish an atmosphere. "Adjustor" is the standout track here. It doesn't seem possible that the to-and-fro simplicity of its primary hook could be so engaging, but it is. "All of the Champs That Ever Lived" moves with more urgency but still manages to keep up the eerie quietude over Miranda's lightning chops. "Bruise" is one of the more minimalist pieces here, beginning with an ambient keyboard and slowly building with a gorgeous melody. "Malaria Codes", which could be confused for a Groove Armada track if the sound wasn't so organic, is propelled from good to great by the jazzy horn accompaniment that enters halfway through.

If there were a real negative to this record, it would be that the music cannot exist at any time or place. Don't throw it on for the first time unless you plan on giving it your full attention. The music is almost dependent on the listener's concentration, and I won't lie -- at times, this can be a struggle. The clicks, blips, beeps and noise occasionally come too far forward, resulting in an aural overload that can subvert your interest if you're not careful. Fight through it, though, and you will be rewarded. A good imagination helps. Because there are no lyrics, you are free to invent your own visual representation of what this music is trying to say. For me, it tells me to keep…driving…faster. And that's indicative of good rock and roll. Dave Dierksen - Pop Matters

download: the octopus project - one ten hundred thousand million


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gojira - the link

.:: The French band Gojira really broke through with their 2006 CD From Mars To Sirius. It got great reviews and the band has done some major tours in the past year. For those North American fans who never got the chance to hear Gojira's earlier material, their second CD, 2003's The Link has been remastered and re-released.

Gojira has a unique sound, and their second CD was just as good as From Mars To Sirius. They have a lot of thrash elements in their songs, including some really memorable riffs. Their songwriting is really inventive and doesn't use the usual verse, chorus, verse structure. There are a lot of unusual and almost proggy parts on The Link including long instrumental sections, strange keys and unusual rhythm patterns.

This is a really eclectic CD that has everything from dreamy acoustic interludes to fast thrash songs and nearly everything else in between. Those who recently discovered and like Gojira will definitely want to delve into their back catalog, including this excellent album.

download: gojira - the link


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david simons - prismatic hearing

.:: David Simons composes music for theater, dance, film, installations, and concert ensembles. His unusual collection of sounds from self-built and non-European instruments combines with digital sampling technologies to create a unique pan-cultural music. He has devised his own method of using the Theremin as a Midi controller. David is a graduate of the California Institute of the Arts, studying composition with Earle Brown, Morton Subotnick, James Tenney, Harold Budd; percussion teachers include John Bergamo (Cal Arts), Paul Price (Manhattan School Of Music), and Alan Dawson (Berklee).

David has researched and performed music from many of the world’s cultures, and furthered his music studies in Bali, Bangkok and Seoul. As a founding member of the FUTURE PRIMITIVE ENSEMBLE his pieces were heard live on radio and in concert throughout the U.S. He has also performed on tour in Java, Bali, Korea, Japan, Eastern and Western Europe, Canada, Cuba and Hawaii. For many years he has been a member of Gamelan Son of Lion and Music for Homemade Instruments in New York, both of which regularly premiere his works.

David has received numerous awards and grants, including a 2003 Rockefeller Foundation residency at Bellagio, Italy to compose music for NEWBAND and their collection of Harry Partch instruments. In 1998 American Composers Forum and Jerome Foundation funded the Gamelan Son of Lion’s commission for David to write Music for Theremin and Gamelan, and an Arts International travel grant and Asian Cultural Council grant enabled him to perform it in Bali (2000); other awards include Harvestworks Artist-In-Residence (‘95 Project Residency, ‘89 computer music Programming Residency); Canada Council Visiting Foreign Artist (‘92) for sound installation at Art Metropole in Toronto; Composer-in-Residence at American Dance Festival (‘91); NY Foundation for the Arts Composition Fellowship (‘90, 2000); ASCAP Special Awards (1987-02); and several Meet the Composer commissions.

The American Music Center’s recovery grant ‘Music Liberty Initiative for NY’, was awarded in 2002. The Mid Atlantic Arts Foundation sponsored a teaching and instrument building residency in 2005 with artist Ken Butler, Lisa Karrer and David Simons at the Avampato Museum in Charleston, West Virginia.

In collaboration with Lisa Karrer, David has received Artslink and Arts International awards for projects in Estonia (95-03), and the Mary Flagler Cary Commissioning Grant to compose their chamber opera "The Birth of George" (‘96). This opera was produced by Harvestworks and American Opera Projects and had its workshop premiere at La Mama in ‘97, supported by the Jerome Foundation and Greenwall Foundation, and an Aaron Copland Recording grant was received in ‘98 to make a CD, released on TELLUS in 2003. David’s CD on TZADIK "Prismatic Hearing" was released in 2004.

.:: Of the ten diverse pieces on Prismatic Hearing, only two share the same instrumentation. That the CD is nonetheless cohesive is due to the characterful nature of David Simons's compositions. He's a longstanding member of two very different ensembles, Music for Homemade Instruments and Gamelan Son of Lion, both of which play on Prismatic Hearing. He's also worked extensively in film, theater and dance, and the longest piece here, "Picasso/Rossinirape", composed in 2003 for BAD Co in Zagreb, Croatia, was written to accompany a dance in which a woman relives her rape in excruciating detail while contorting herself in the manner of a Picasso portrait. The source material is, as the title suggests, sampled from Rossini, his Messe Solonelle, but the music is fractured into new rhythmic and melodic shapes and rendered distinctly ominous, benefitting from Simons's virtuoso use of sampling technology.

The earliest of the compositions, written in 1974 while Simons was a student at the California Institute of the Arts, is "Crown of Thorns", for harpsichord, guitar, harp, cello, vibraphone, marimba and gongs. It plays for a mere 36 seconds. This is the only piece on the CD that's strongly reminiscent of another composer: the Frank Zappa of his most accomplished album, Uncle Meat.

Most of the other pieces on Prismatic Hearing were composed during the 1990s and the current decade, and by then Simons had a sure grasp of his materials and the ends to which they could be put. One of his innovations is to use a theremin both as itself and as a MIDI controller of sampled sounds. Theremin-triggered samples feature on "Information" and Dematerialized". The latter very effectively illustrates how orchestral sounds and voices, modulated electronically, can be shaped into a composition that transcends its source materials. During the final couple of minutes the intense drama of the piece is undercut by humour, as interleaved and patchworked voices recite phrases such as "A burgundy suede spider is humping an oil slick".

According to Simons, prismatic hearing is the process by which our minds reconstitute sounds while we're actively hearing them, filtering them according to our tastes and prejudices, etc. He points out that, in many cases, "this results in a more interesting phrase than the original". Something similar could be argued about his use of sampled material on Prismatic Hearing. The Wire, Brian Marley - 1995

download: david simons - prismatic hearing


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tin hat trio - helium

.:: Transplanted from New York to the Bay Area, the chamber jazz group Tin Hat Trio consists of accordionist Rob Burger, guitarist Mark Orton, and violinist Carla Kihlstedt. The group's unique blend of structure, improvisation, and contemporary classical, folk, world, and jazz elements reflects each member's other performing experiences.

Kihlstedt majored in classical violin performance at the Oberlin Conservatory and went on to become a prominent performer in both classical and improvised music, playing with artists like John Zorn and Roscoe Mitchell, and recording with Eugene Chadbourne, the Grassy Knoll, and Tom Waits. She also appeared on Philip Glass' series Music at the Anthology, sings and plays with another Bay Area band (Charming Hostess), collaborates with choreographer Jo Kreiter, and is a graphic designer/illustrator as well.

Orton started playing guitar as a child and eventually studied composition at the Peabody Conservatory and the Hart School of Music. Also a professional recording and sound engineer, Orton worked on sessions with Bill Frisell, John Zorn, and the Lounge Lizards, and engineered the sound at the Knitting Factory for two years. Orton plays banjo, lute, dobro, lap steel, and electric guitar with his other group, San Francisco's Old Joe Clarks, and has composed scores for independent films like Beverly Wachtel's Just Noticeable Difference.

Burger studied classical piano at Juilliard and explored different improvisational styles at the University of Massachusetts with Max Roach, Archie Stepp, and Yusef Lateef. He broadened his range to include Hammond organ and vintage keyboards like the Optigan and Chamberlin, toy pianos and keyboards, and the accordion.

Burger has toured with Bill Frisell, Don Byron, and Joey Baron, and appeared on Frisell's Tales from the Far Side soundtrack. Since moving to the Bay Area, Burger has worked with artists as diverse as Tipsy and Mix Master Mike; he is also a member of the Oranj Symphonette, as well as his bandmate Orton's other project, Old Joe Clarks. As the Tin Hat Trio, they released their debut album, Memory Is an Elephant, on Angel Records in early 1999; Helium followed in spring 2000, boasting appearances from Tom Waits and an uncredited Mike Patton.

Two years later, the ambitious The Rodeo Eroded showcased their own unique music as well as guest appearances from Phish drummer Jon Fishman and Willie Nelson. 2004's Book of Silk went in a more abstract direction; that year, Burger left the band, while frequent collaborators Ara Anderson and clarinetist Ben Goldberg joined the fold. Reflecting their new status, the group rechristened themselves Tin Hat for 2007's The Sad Machinery of Spring. ~ Heather Phares, All Music Guide

.:: You know you've got a strange sort of magic going on when a scratchy vocal by Tom Waits (on the reprise of the hypnotic, chamber music meets French cafe and spaghetti western title track) is the least bizarre element. The trio of Rob Burger (accordion, piano, pump organ, marxophone, harmonica), Carla Kihlstedt (violin, viola), and Mark Orton (guitar, Dobro, banjo) offer a vision of what a chamber music group might sound like if they mixed a studio session for a Western film with a rhythmically diverse, often atonal classical excursion.

The opening track "A Life in East Poultney" finds a banjo plucking over a droning violin as bells ring in the background. That same violin does a seductive dance over a plucky organ base and accordion harmonies on the title track, which evolves into the image of a train blowing harmonica steam across the land. "Scrap" rolls like a schizophrenic fiddle tune, and then the fiddling slows down into a mosey on the wacky and atonal "Sand Dog Blues." And by that point, when the craziness is just beginning, you're either tripping and enjoying or wondering who these three are and just why they think this is commercial music.

The New Yorker put it best when it said their music is "a soundtrack for the kind of puzzling dream which leaves you sitting awake in the middle of the night." You will love it or loathe it, but you can't just shrug and ignore it. Jonathan Widran, All Music Guide~ Jonathan Widran, All Music Guide

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dague de miséricord - dérobé

.:: Dague de miséricorde's Dérobé, a 3 track forray into improvisation. As we are taken down a path of anti-structuralism, we see images and textures emerging from what seems to be chaos, into amazingly well detailed scenes and moods.

The violins become intricate parts of the action and even actors, as we bear witness to every minute detail Dague de miséricorde offers to us; the silences become part of the instruments and what seemed chatoic at first is now an orchestration of movement, of action, in a graceful danse of sounds and images.

A welcomed breather from sequence and barriers, Dérobé's sounds are distant and strange, yet refreshing; they let the mind wander and imagine in perfect and beautiful randomness.

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mew - and the glass handed kites

.:: Producing dark and atmospheric songs, Mew posses a graceful beauty and create an epic sound with strikingly memorable tunes over which delicate vocals soar to angelic heights. Two years after their award-winning debut album Frengers wowed the critics, the Danish four-piece's follow-up, And The Glass Handed Kites is the fourth album for the dream-pop four piece but only the second to be available to a worldwide audience.


.:: Prog rock seems to go in and out of favor pretty quickly. Anyone remember The Mars Volta? Their first record was a prog renaissance, and their second disc split critics divisively. Was it a brilliant, long-winded masterpiece or just a lot of hot air and snobbish guitar playing with pretentious lyrics? Or was it both? Prog rock fans not satisfied by current offerings in America will have to consult the Danish band Mew for their latest fix.

We have all the hallmarks of a good prog record here: the rhythms are often reliant on non-traditional time signatures, songs fade in and out or run together instead of stopping and starting, and even the cover art seems ludicrously over-the-top in its inherent cheesiness. Also there's a "concept," as in Mew have made a concept album. I honestly don't know what the hell the concept is, though. Most of the lyrics are difficult to decipher. What I can glean is that we have songs about first loves and a chinaberry tree. We have semi-cleverly titled prog and metal clichés like "Apocalypso". We have a completely nonsensical album title that sounds cool while high or hoping to get high: And the Glass Handed Kites. The stars are aligned for a progressive masterpiece, and Mew certainly try to create one for us. Their noble attempt generates many excellent songs not easily confused with most of what currently appears on modern rock and heavy metal radio.

The album begins deceptively with a heavy instrumental bloated with loud guitars, toms that sound like tympanis, and a booming snare. Don't be fooled by the beginning, though, as the song slowly melts into a choral melody of pop extravagance. It's deceptive because Mew is more pop-based than they let on. My only previous Mew experience is a song called "Saliva". That track is pure piano-driven pop that bounces along with about five separate but excellent vocal hooks. The good news about And the Glass Handed Kite's bloated masturbatory excess is that the pop sensibilities of "Saliva" remain. "Special" moves from a straight forward verse and simple downbeat bass notes to a shifting chorus with strummed triplets on guitar. By the second time through the cycle, it's changed. "An Envoy to the Open Fields" is constantly cutting off your attempts to play air drums the beat at home, so don't try. You'll injure something if you do. All the while, however, the melodies convert the complex instrumentation into manageable sideshows for the superior main event. It's this complexity that will either turn listeners off or intrigue them to devote a few listens to these songs. And if they do listen more than once, those brilliant pop melodies will hook them for life.

In the hands of a less pop-minded band, these tunes would probably be mostly innocuous, but when Jonas Bjerre's angelic voice breaks from the intricate guitar lines, you're left with glorious pop music. And I mean glorious. Often complex and catchy, the melodies are frequently mimicked note for note by another instrument, be it guitar, piano, or xylophone. "Zookeeper's Boy" (just imagine the "concept" possibilities of that title) is the height of cheesy synths backing a melody that's either wordless or repeats the phrase "Are you my lady?" I can't tell. But I can tell that I remember its melody exactly.

What often saves this record from the tedium that plagues many prog bands is the length of the songs. Only two songs are longer than five minutes, and they're the last two, so you don't even feel bad if you stop the CD early. Actually, I'd recommend it. That would cut the album down from its prog-like runtime and provide you with 14 more minutes to try to figure out exactly what the "concept" is.

download: mew - and the glass handed kites


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alexei borisov - abstractionist

.:: The legend of Soviet and Russian underground Alexei Borisov comes to the net with a selection of two astonishing abstract tunes.

It is an exclusive recording of live sets performed by Borisov during his combined American tour with Jeff Surak (Violet). "Artworks" is a name of a gallery in Richmond and "Cakeshop" is a club in Manhattan, NY.

Abstract electronics in the realm of the avant-garde is the forte of Russian sound artist Alexei Borisov. Two online albums feature live performances of this creative and sometimes perplexing underground figure.

The appropriately titled Abstractionist features two lengthy tracks of noise and tones. Often the sounds appears to have no real connection and are seemingly random although I suspect this is not the case. “Artworks” is the more abtract piece and requires your full undivided attention to appreciate it.

However “Cakeshop” is a little more accessible. A melody can barely be deciphered among the odd electronic drone but even this is soon lost is a bewlidering by fascinating collage of electronics and found sound. This is a challenging but rewarding listen.

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maserati - the language of cities

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.:: Named after a second-fiddle Italian luxury car, Athens, Georgia's Maserati set themselves up for a superb analogy with the world of motorsports. A curious coincidence points us toward such a comparison: what band's name starts with "M", ends with "I", and plays grandiose, instrumental post-rock? If you said Mogwai, you made the right call.

Maserati's use of standard rock instrumentation and explorations of musical forms outside the genre may have come a few years too late -- bands like Tortoise and Shipping News being only two of the many acts to excel at this in the mid-'90s. Still, Language of Cities is an excellent debut from a post-rock band whose Athens, GA, roots would imply a more Brian Wilson-esque approach to songwriting.

Though most songs meander thoughtfully through tremolo-filled guitar passages tinted with soft-brushed cymbals, songs like "Keep It Gold" go for the more complex, forward-churning tendencies of bands like Polvo. The open spaces on songs like "Being a President Is Like Riding a Tiger" suggest that these guys have listened to some of the more organic IDM and ambient electronic music like Labradford or Aphex Twin, building textures instead of stringing along notes. Hardly a breakthrough, Language of Cities is more like a retrospective of all that was great about the last decade's instrumental rock without all the missteps that have made the genre such a cliché.


download: maserati - the language of cities


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thurston moore - psychic hearts

.:: Thurston Moore has said that although he's flattered when younger bands cite Sonic Youth as an influence, it would be nice if the group were rewarded with greater record sales. Of course, Moore knows well why his group has a limited audience. While artists as diverse as Nirvana, the Beastie Boys and even Nine Inch Nails borrow from the Sonic palette – the feedback, dissonance, improvisation and sublime textures – they also employ the kind of pop hooks that Sonic Youth have consistently subverted in their own music. Even the Sonics' most easily digestible songs – "Kool Thing," "Sugar Kane," "Self-Obsessed and Sexxee" – ultimately consume themselves: a devastating blast of distortion here, a jarring tempo change there, a crescendo into total chaos. To question why Sonic Youth don't sell as well as the Beastie Boys is like wondering why Sun Ra was never as popular as Miles Davis.

The analogy isn't entirely gratuitous. Like the late Sun Ra, Moore is a total freak who takes great pleasure in mocking both the elitism of the avant-garde and the anti-intellectualism of pop culture. So it shouldn't come as much of a surprise to anyone who has followed Sonic Youth that Psychic Hearts, Moore's first solo album, puts rock on trial in the High Court of Art.

Using pop culture – particularly cheesy 70s rock – as a metaphor for society as a whole, Moore castigates those who abuse the counterculture's most vulnerable denizens: young girls, sensitive boys, misfits and loners. In the title song his protagonist tells a girl who has been emotionally wrecked by her parents and peers: "My prayer to you is that you do all the things you set out to do/And live your life the way you love/But will you remember one thing for me?/I will always love you." It's a tender moment (despite the potential irony of that last line) for the sometimes hard to peg Moore.

Moore also attempts to restore rock's counterculture identity throughout Psychic Hearts, dropping the names of Mick Jagger and Steven Tyler in "Queen Bee and Her Pals," christening Yoko Ono the Queen of Noise in "Ono Soul," citing such 70s titles as Hotter Than Hell and "Fox on the Run" in "Cindy (Rotten Tanx)" and quoting, note for note, the gloomy melody from the Stones' "Moonlight Mile" in "Female Cop." In doing all this he plays a kind of Robin Hood, using his major-label status to return the music to the real underground, latter-day indie rockers such as the Grifters or Smog, who make low-fi music in their bedrooms.

Such gestures offer proof that Thurston Moore is the soul of Sonic Youth. That doesn't mean, however, that Psychic Hearts works like a Sonic Youth album. What makes the Sonics tick is their all-consuming band sound, the warm yet intimidating cavelike atmospherics, the ringing harmonics and microtonal interplay between Moore and guitarist Lee Ranaldo. Without bassist Kim Gordon's dark, moody and very female ruminations or Ranaldo's shimmering fret work and folk-based melodies, Moore – accompanied by guitarist Tim Foljahn and Sonic Youth drummer Steve Shelley – is left to his own devices: his chunky guitar and bass playing, feedback, drones, dissonance, angular song structures and whiny vocals.

The trio's monolithic din becomes somewhat tedious over 15 songs and more than an hour of music, but Moore allows his sound to evolve from the arty rock of the opener "Queen Bee and Her Pals" to the psychedelia of "Cherry's Blues" and "Female Cop" near the end of the album. Psychic Hearts closes with an exhausting, 19-minute composition that pits the Grateful Dead against the Velvet Underground: "Elegy for All the Dead Rock Stars" rises from three solid minutes of sustained guitar strumming to a dramatic storm of guitar, bass and drums before giving way to a gentle, meditative finale.

What's most impressive about Psychic Hearts, however, is that it paints a 3-D portrait of Thurston Moore the artist, who has often come off as too cool, detached and attitude-laden for his own good. The album doesn't hold together as seamlessly as Sonic Youth's classic Daydream Nation or sustain the momentum of Sister or Dirty. It probably won't win as many new converts as the Sonics' major-label debut, Goo. But as a coherent statement of purpose, as confirmation that Moore remains committed to experimental music and fascinated by the precarious relationship between high and low art, Psychic Hearts offers hope for an endangered species: genuine alternative rock. mark kemp - rolling stone


download: thurston moore - psychic hearts


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roni size - in the mode

.:: With more big-time backing than any junglist save toothy Goldie, the Roni Size all-stars return with a punchy suite of material that sounds so crossed over it could snap. The big-beat drums continue to push drum & bass toward soulful house; the vocals by MC Dynamite as well as guests Method Man and Zach de la Rocha continue to demand hip-hop respect; and the form is repeated, again and again, over and over, at 180 beats per minute. A funky key lick that might bob and weave in an able DJ's hands goes stale quickly over the duration of a long-form CD, but still Size soldiers onward with barely a tempo change. It's mystifying, as he holds so many live wires in his hands.

Though the complaint department is firing full force over this seemingly unfinished release, make no mistake that crisp organic jungle standards such as "Ghetto Superstar" will continue to define the name brand, setting dance floors into a kinetic frenzy for many seasons past the shelf date. --Ian Christe

.:: Roni Size and his Reprazent crew do not make simple music. And he does not appreciate it being categorized as such. "I got very offended the other day," Size recalls. "I said to someone, 'What is this?' And they said, 'Oh, it's drum-and-bass with a rapper.' I thought, 'Come on! Is that the best you can come up with? Drum-and-bass with a fucking rapper?'"

Fair enough, such lazy categorization does a disservice to Size's furiously paced, multi-layered hybrid of hip-hop, drum-and-bass and jazz beats, a potent combo that earned his groundbreaking 1997 album New Forms England's coveted Mercury Prize for Best Album and remains just as stunning on his new disc, In the Mode. Highlighted by collaborations with Method Man, Zack de la Rocha and the Roots' Rahzel, as well as Size's growing understanding of American hip-hop and a dense layer of beats he refers to as a "wall of sound," In the Mode is as ambitious a release as any album in 2000.

But to merely recognize Size's recorded output is to miss a big part of the picture. As an artist, Size says he is driven by a desire to create something his fans can spread the gospel about with conviction. He wants them to believe it when they say to someone, "It's all about fucking Roni Size." And however impressive his albums may be, that kind of conviction comes from experiencing Reprazent live. Following in the tradition of bands like Led Zeppelin, Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band and U2, Size takes pride in the fact that most of his faithful have been converted at his concerts.

While it's unusual for an ensemble (Size emphasizes that Reprazent is a "collective," not a band) in one of the sub-genres of electronic music to be lauded for their live performances, Size says it was after witnessing another electronic band -- Prodigy -- that he made the vow to take Reprazent's stage show to the next level. "I ended up DJing in Amsterdam at a show with the Prodigy," he explains. "I knew of Prodigy years before that, and I've always DJed at certain gigs with them, but it wasn't until we got to Amsterdam and I saw them perform in front of like a 10,000 deep crowd and they smashed the place to fucking bits that I realized that I wanted to do what they're doing."

To Size, people finding the ensemble by seeing them play live keeps the music real, and not a product of the media. "We go onto a stage in the middle of France before an audience who have never heard of us and at the beginning of the show they're like, 'What's this?,'" he says. "Halfway through the show they start moving; and by the end of the show, they are going crazy. The beauty about what we are is we've been discovered rather than hyped."

There has been some hype surrounding Reprazent -- a lot, actually -- that's the flip side of winning the Mercury Prize. And though Size is shrewd enough to realize that collaborating with the likes of Method Man and de la Rocha will only add to the hype, he shrugs it off. "I'm just doing what I'm doing," he says. "I love Method Man, he's a true hip-hop character. And I'm excited not just by the thought of him on my album, but for him to actually flip it and bust a flow on there . . ."

As for de la Rocha, Size almost seems at a loss for words. "Zack is a fast-talking political agenda b-boy," he says. "It's like, 'What is he?' You put Zack on a Roni Size track, where it doesn't even sound like me, what does it become then? Tell me please. It's great that no one can actually pinpoint what it is. I'm looking forward to seeing what people come up with."

Perhaps feeling a bit sorry for us though, he relents and provides a small clue as to how he would depict his music. "No matter what, a Roni Size track is not a jungle track. It's not a hip-hop track. It's fucking something else." STEVE BALTIN (October 24, 2000)


download: roni size - in the mode


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diamanda galás - schrei x

.:: Based on Diamanda Galas earlier work Schrei 27, which consisted of several short performances over the space of 27minutes, SCHREI X will alternate extreme high-energy vocal work with absolute silence. The work takes place in darkness.

The performances are chapters of a confessions with might have been induced through a chemical or mechanical manipulation of the brain. There is a high density of speech-sound over time which is often machine-like in its velocity. The work employs the atypical speech and vocal signal processing that Ms. Galas has been researching since 1979.

SCHREI 27 was a commission of the 1994 New American Radio series and was made possible by a grant from the Meet The Composer/Reader's Digest Commissioning Program, in partnership with the National Endowment for the Arts and the Lila Wallace-Reader's Digest Fund. It was developed for national broadcast with New Radio and Performing Arts. The development of Schrei 27 would not have been possible without the support of a creative residency at the Walker Art Center (Minneapolis, MN.)


The New York Times - 'In Performance' section Monday February 26, 1996
by:NEIL STRAUSS

A Step into the Past Presented in Darkness

Diamanda Galas Knitting Factory

On Wednesday night, the avant-garde vocalist Diamanda Galas sang "Schrei X," a half-hour piece that she delivered in complete darkness. For 13 years Ms. Galas has been presenting works that are more performance based than this, most of them a response to AIDS. "Schrei X" was a step back, into a solipsistic blackness. Instead of being overtly political, the piece, based on a radio work she created in 1994, favored the more general themes of anguish and isolation present in her music from the early 1980's.

Ms. Galas stood in front of five microphones, and as she delivered "Schrei X" she moved her head around them, sending her voice swirling through a quadraphonic sound system. She alternated sec- tions of abstract utterances and si- lence with a mix of her own texts and passages from the Book of Job and St. Thomas Aquinas. The narrative sections were about transitions be- tween life and death, salvation and condemnation, sanity and madness, with Ms. Galas powerful voice con- veying the agony of being trapped in an intermediate are (such of being institutionalized or buried alive).

More revealing than the meaning of "Schrei X" was the sound. "Schrei" is German for shriek, but Ms. Galas did more. She growled, cackled, screeched, pleaded, wailed and sang, jumping as much as two octaves between utterances.

With a sparing use of digital ef- fects, she often mad it seem as if multiple speakers wer fulminating at the same time or as if the sounds were electronic and not human. In the darkness, "Schrei X" conjured not Dante's "Inferno" but a claustro- phobic internal hell where the same demons lurk.New York Times - 1996

download: diamanda galás - schrei x


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jonathan harvey - from silence, nataraja, ritual melodies

||| RESPOSTED |||

.:: Harvey has a truly global reputation, particularly for his work in the field of electro-acoustic music (he has been commissioned by IRCAM on eight separate occasions), where he is considered as one of the most skilled and imaginative composers using the electronic medium today.

He has also composed for most other genres, including large orchestra, ensemble and solo instrumental. He is particularly renowned for his choral music, much of which is suited for church performance, most notably his church opera Passion and Resurrection. He is frequently featured at all the major European music festivals. From 2005 he is Composer-in-Residence at the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra. He is currently writing an opera for Nederlands Opera.

Born in Warwickshire in 1939, Jonathan Harvey was a chorister at St Michael's College, Tenbury and later a major music scholar at St John's College, Cambridge. He gained doctorates from the universities of Glasgow and Cambridge and also studied privately (on the advice of Benjamin Britten) with Erwin Stein and Hans Keller. He was a Harkness Fellow at Princeton (1969-70).

An invitation from Boulez to work at IRCAM in the early 1980s has resulted in eight realisations at the Institute, or for the Ensemble Intercontemporain, including the tape piece Mortuos Plango Vivos Voco, Bhakti for ensemble and electronics, Ritual Melodies for computer-manipulated sounds, and Advaya for cello and live and pre-recorded sounds. Harvey has also composed for most other genres: orchestra (including Madonna of Winter and Spring, Tranquil Abiding and White as Jasmine), chamber (including four String Quartets, Soleil Noir/Chitra, and Death of Light, Light of Death, for instance) as well as works for solo instruments.

He has produced a large output of choral works, including the large cantata with electronics Mothers shall not Cry (2000). His church opera Passion and Resurrection (l981) was the subject of a BBC television film, and has received twelve subsequent performances. His opera Inquest of Love, commissioned by ENO, was premiered there in 1993 and repeated at Theatre de la Monnaie, Brussels in 1994.

Harvey now attracts commissions from many international organisations. His music has been extensively played and toured by, amongst others, Ensemble Modern, Ensemble Intercontemporain, Asko, Nieuw Ensemble (Amsterdam) and Ictus Ensemble (Brussels). About 80 recordings are available on CD. He is regularly performed at all the major international contemporary music festivals, and is one of the most skilled and imaginative composers working in electronic music. He has honorary doctorates from the universities of Southampton and Bristol, is a Member of Academia Europaea, and in 1993 was awarded the prestigious Britten Award for composition.

He published two books in 1999, on inspiration and spirituality respectively. Arnold Whittall’s study of his music appeared, published by Faber & Faber (and in French by IRCAM) in the same year. Two years later John Palmer published a substantial study: "Jonathan Harvey's Bhakti" (Edwin Mellen Press). Harvey was Professor of Music at Sussex University for 18 years, where he is now Honorary Professor of Music. He is Professor Emeritus of Music at Stanford University, California (Professor 1995-2000), and an Honorary Fellow of St John's College, Cambridge. He is Composer-in-Residence at the BBC Scottish Symphony Orchestra.

download: jonathan harvey - from silence, nataraja, ritual melodies


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æthenor - deep in ocean sunk the lamp of light

.:: Æthenor Deep in Ocean Sunk the Lamp of Light LP/CD
Debut by trio of Stephen O’Malley (Sunn0))))), Daniel O’Sullivan (Guapo), and Vincent de Roguin (Shora). Taking its title from The Iliad, the music here is deep and cosmic, completely unlike anything you’d expect from such heavyweights. More in the tradition of ‘Spiral Insana” and “Cyborg” than anything, the tracks float along in a masterful collage of activity, where careful scene changes highlight O’Sullivan’s classic but artfully placed Rhodes bombs, de Roguin’s organ, and O’Malley’s guitar.

Extraordinary effort has gone into editing, mastering, and shaping these pieces – these are not tossed off improvisations or “side-project” orphans. Housed in CD and LP jackets hand-printed by Alan Sherry/SIWA.

Earlier this year we all fell in love with the absolutely killer (but sadly ridiculously limited) 'Twisted Stems' 7" from moody Londoners Guapo, and now we have the perfect accompaniment. Aethenor is the project of Daniel O'Sullivan (of Guapo), the prolific and omnipresent Stephen O'Malley (Sunn o))), Khanate, KTL) and Vincent De Roguin and between them they have managed to lay down some of the most earth shatteringly atmospheric and cinematic soundscapes this side of Earth's incredible 'Hex' album.

The reason we all got so misty-eyed over 'Twisted Stems' was its reliance on that Badalamenti sound we all know and love, but this album takes that sound one step further in a soup of Rhodes and clattering celluloid sounds, transporting the listener into darkened alcohol drenched saloons and cold, lonely desert landscapes effortlessly. Although doom-metal's grand magus Stephen O'Malley is hard at work here again, don't be expecting a treatise in drone - Aethenor have come up with something far more atmospheric and far less genre specific than you ever would have thought.

The droning guitar is submerged somewhere in the mix below thick electric piano and decomposing field recordings, between clattering pots and pans and the sound of creaking wood. You can almost hear the chattering ghosts of cowboys, whores and sheriffs in the distance somewhere, hidden under crackling vinyl and a small boy collecting glasses behind the door.

This is intense and deeply visual music, bringing to mind so many images you don't even need track titles to give you any clues - in fact a visual accompaniment would do the album an injustice; it gives you everything you need simply from the sound. Those of you left gasping for more after Deaf Center's 'Pale Ravine' and Svarte Greiner's 'Knive' should look no further - this is how it is done, and it doesn't really get much better than this.

download: æthenor - deep in ocean sunk the lamp of light


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1980 - 2000 20 years of dischord

.:: Perhaps in the same way as The Force, the influence of Dischord Records should not be underestimated. The 22-year-old label has had so many significant names and bands on its roster it's sometimes easy to forget what a small operation the company actually is. Founded in 1980 by teenagers Ian MacKaye and Jeff Nelson in order to self-release material they recorded in their hardcore punk band the Teen Idles, the strong sense of community in the Washington Hardcore (harDCore) scene and those who follow it have kept the label going until today.

While I'm not going to repeat the entire history of Dischord here (you'll have to read the booklet like I did), it's important to understand the significance of the label's history. It still operates from a normal house, albeit slightly larger than the original 'Dischord House'. It is still run by a handful of people, most of whom have been there throughout most of its history. The people who run the label are close to the bands whose records they produce and distribute, who are almost exclusively from the DC area. They do not invest in large scale marketing campaigns, music videos or even many singles. Yet, thanks to strong ties with distributors such as Southern Records, their releases are available the world over.

20 Years of Dischord is an anniversary box set (the anniversary was actually in 2000, but it took them longer than expected to produce) documenting the work of the first 50 artists on the label. Comprised of three CDs and a 134 page colour booklet, it features a track by each artist plus 21 unreleased songs, six MPEG videos and other odds and ends.

The booklet is superb - clearly a lot of care and attention has been put into producing it. The front and rear covers show near-identical photos taken of Dischord founders Ian and Jeff in the Discord Office, one from 1983 and the other in 2001. There is a foreword by ape-man Henry Rollins, long-time friend of Ian MacKaye, followed by a two-page spread dedicated to each artist - a page of text and a photo.

The text is full of interesting facts and features a mini-history for each band, you can stare at the photos to give your eyes something to do as you listen to the music - and give your hands a workout by using them to turn the pages. They really have thought of everything.

Whether or not the music would be of interest to people who are not already fans of Dischord is arguable. The tracks are mostly in order of release, and the earlier songs may not be easy to stomach for those who are used to overproduced dirge like Blink 182. But I suppose even then you could say it proves how amazing it is that people who were once so musically inept could set up such a successful label.

Personally I enjoy listening to the raw, untamed energy of the early artists, before moving on to the greater musical diversity of later bands, often featuring the same members as the previous groups.

The only things that are not of superb quality in this collection are the live video clips, but then they were NEVER of a high audio/visual quality. Just remember they were taken in the days before Digital Video Cameras.

If you see this box-set lying idly in a shop, buy it. If you don't like it, give it to someone who does. They'll be your friend for ever.

download: 1980 - 2000 20 years of dischord (cd1)
download: 1980 - 2000 20 years of dischord (cd2)
download: 1980 - 2000 20 years of dischord (cd3) perviously unreleased material

||| i think this is indeed, one of the best albums i've ever posted |||

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woodpigeon - houndstooth ep

||| RE-POSTED |||

.:: Moving away from blissed-out orchestral pop to quiet and refined folk, Woodpigeon raises the stakes on Houndstooth. The six-song EP is a departure for the band – moving from big and complex to small and more intimate. The first two tracks in particular ("In Praise of the West Midlothian Bus Service" and "Oberkampf"), showcase strong, deliberate vocals and effective harmonies and meld hymnal-like swells to create these modern lullabies.

Recorded beautifully by another local favourite, Jane Vain, the band has never sounded more crystalline or precise. Track three, recorded by Aaron Booth, emphasizes the band’s confidence in the new material and showcases the lyrics and intricate acoustics – allowing the song to build and retreat effortlessly.

By shedding the bells and whistles (literally), Woodpigeon allows the listener to hear its growth in every plucked string. By keeping things simple and stripping down its sound, the band has managed to show on Houndstooth that big things really do come in small packages.



download: woodpigeon - houndstooth ep

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kaija saariaho - a portrait of kaija saariaho

.:: Kaija Saariaho is a prominent member of a group of Finnish composers and performers who are now, in mid-career, making a worldwide impact. Born in Helsinki in 1952, she studied at the Sibelius Academy there with the pioneering modernist Paavo Heininen and, with Magnus Lindberg and others, she founded the progressive ‘Ears Open’ group. She continued her studies in Freiburg with Brian Ferneyhough and Klaus Huber, at the Darmstadt summer courses, and, from 1982, at the IRCAM research institute in Paris – the city which has been her home ever since.

At IRCAM, Saariaho developed techniques of computer-assisted composition and acquired fluency in working on tape and with live electronics. This experience influenced her approach to writing for orchestra, with its emphasis on the shaping of dense masses of sound in slow transformations. Significantly, her first orchestral piece, Verblendungen (1984), involves a gradual exchange of roles and character between orchestra and tape. And even the titles of her next, linked, pair of orchestral works, Du Cristal (1989) and …à la Fumée (1990) – the latter with solo alto flute and cello, and both with live electronics – suggest their preoccupation with colour and texture.

Through IRCAM, Saariaho became allied with the French ‘spectralist’ composers, whose techniques are based on computer analysis of the sound-spectrum of individual notes on different instruments. This analytical approach led her to the regular use of harmonies resting on long-held bass notes, microtonal intervals, and a precisely detailed continuum of sound extending from pure tone to unpitched noise – all features of one of her most frequently performed works, Graal théâtre for violin and orchestra or ensemble (1994/97).

In recent years Saariaho has turned to opera, with outstanding success. L’Amour de loin, with a libretto by Amin Maalouf based on an early biography of the twelfth-century troubadour Jaufré Rudel, received widespread acclaim in its premiere production directed by Peter Sellars at the 2000 Salzburg Festival, and won the composer a prestigious Grawemeyer Award. Adriana Mater, on an original libretto by Maalouf, mixing gritty present-day reality and dreams, followed, again directed by Sellars, at the Opéra Bastille in Paris in March 2006.

Around the operas there have been other vocal works, notably the ravishing Château de l’âme (1996), Oltra mar (1999), and the song-cycle Quatre instants (2002). And the evening-long La Passion de Simone, portraying the life and death of the philosopher Simone Weil, will form part of Sellars’s international festival ‘New Crowned Hope’ in 2006/07.

The experience of writing for voices has led to some simplification of Saariaho’s language, with a new vein of modally oriented melody accompanied by more regular repeating patterns. This change of direction has been carried over into orchestral works including Aile du songe for flute and chamber orchestra (2001) and the stunning Orion for large orchestra (2002) – with a new cello concerto to come for the Boston Symphony Orchestra in February 2007.

In the profusion of large and small works which Saariaho has produced in recent years, two features which have marked her whole career continue to stand out. One is a close and productive association with individual artists – not least Amin Maalouf and Peter Sellars, as well as the conductor Esa-Pekka Salonen, the flautist Camilla Hoitenga, the cellist Anssi Karttunen, the soprano Dawn Upshaw and, more recently, the pianist Emmanuel Ax. The other is a concern, shown equally in her choice of subject matter and texts and in the profusion of expression marks in her scores, to make her music not a working-out of abstract processes but an urgent communication from composer to listener of ideas, images and emotions. kaija saariaho

download: kaija saariaho - a portrait of kaija saariaho

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fugazi - furniture + 2

.:: Fugazi is a band from Washington, D.C. They played their first show on September 3, 1987 and since then they have released seven albums and toured the world extensively covering all fifty United States, Europe, Australia, South America, Japan and many points in between. The band is self managed and release all their material through Dischord Records.

The band maintains a policy of affordable access to their work through low record and ticket prices and all concerts are all-ages.

Fugazi's most recent musical releases are "The Argument" 10 song album and the "Furniture" 3 song single, both recorded in the spring of 2001 and released in the fall of 2001. These sessions mark the first studio appearance of long time roadie, Jerry Busher, who plays additional drums and percussion on a number of the tracks. The recordings were made in collaboration with long time Fugazi engineer Don Zientara at Inner Ear studios.

Fugazi is currently on an indefinite hiatus as they tend to young families and other musical projects.

Released in conjunction with Argument, Furniture is a three-song EP putting together older tracks that had yet to be put on disc. Running with similar consistency to the 3 Songs EP that preceded Repeater, these older songs still sound fresh.

"Furniture," with its trademark Ian MacKaye call-response vocal, would have been quite comfortable on either of the first two EPs. The Guy Picciotto-led "Hello Morning" is reminiscent of "Break-In," while the driving instrumental second track, "Number 5," is scorching. Thankfully kept separate from the very different Argument, this should be heard by any Fugazi fan, no matter what time of the band they consider the best. ~ Chris True

download: fugazi - furniture + 2

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