compilations

sampler featuring some old / some to-be-released / some exclusive tracks from the likes of Avarus, Clay Figure, Tivol, Braspyreet, Pylon, Kamialliset Ystavat, Plat Ypus, Grey Park, Kukkiva Polisi, Fransiscan Hobbies, Keijo, Rauhan Orkestri etc - 28 tracks in total 

Archival solo recordings by various members of the A Band, released on a label from Azerbaijan. Stewart Walden, Astral Social Club, Gay Animal Women, Well Crucial, Selpopeplel, Walden / Campbell / Plaistow and Afterclap.

Three guitarists who have gravitated to Berkeley , California , with a homage to those innovators of fingerstyle playing, John Fahey and Robbie Basho, neither of whom came from Berkely either. The gathering of the three soloists was captured on half inch tape, no less, in a short space of time and includes set pieces and improvised work. On the whole, they keep to the sunnier side of the street: Adam Snider's The Anger Of God elicits the words brutal and ferocity in the liner notes, but this seems an anger well managed to my ears. Most material is original, but Matt Baldwin opts for a couple of covers - the inevitable Anji which, I'm pleased to say, turns out completely distinctive from any other version I've heard, and Split, Part 2 by the Groundhogs. I was well pleased to find that here. The fine quality package includes a sleevenote by Ed Denson who ran record labels with John Fahey and Stefan Grossman. (JC)

Concentric Spaces cdr (Striate Cortex) 3

Excellent compilation of "moods": drone, ambient, musique concrete and abstract electronics. Featuring (<0>), Enfer Boreal, Donato Epiro, Small Things on Sundays, Dronaement, SHG, Mirko Uhlig, Sympathetic Division, Joinedbywire and Imago Meccano. Nice textured sleeve.

Concentric Spaces Vol 2 cdr (Striate Cortex) 3.50

Featuring Deep Loom, Wbaum, Vibrafuzz, Enfer Boreal, Trudy, Cannibal Movie, P:ink Desert, Spaces Between, Seabuckthorn, Ammonites. Handmade packaging.

Doing the Right Thing Takes the Emptiness Away cdr (Pjorn) 2

Good compilation from Edinburgh's Pjorn label featuring a whole host of electronics wreakers and sound manipulators including Culver, Alistair Crosbie, Wounded Knee, Fordell Research Unit, Opaque and more. Particularly fine: the skin-crawling noise of Kylie Minoise, descending guitar patterns and creaking bowed cello from Culver and the brilliant Wounded Knee with one of his fine looping self-harmonising vocal creations.

Elsie and Jack and Chair cd (Elsie and Jack) 9.50 

great comp compiling some of the most fascinating sounds in the world of abstract noise and drone, featuring Fuxa, Crawlunit, Shifts, Tabata, Rapoon, Mhlest, Pregnant Pause, Flutter, Totemplow and Monera

Elsie and Jack and Drake cd (Elsie and Jack) 9.50

Friends & Family 3cdr (Golem) 7

"The 10th golem-release is a 3xcd-r compilation (more than 3½ hours of music) featuring active Danish projects in some way surrounding the label, most of the projects being by members of shiggajon, projects that are not often presented. Being very extensive, this compilation should make up a pretty good introduction to this part of ”experimental” Danish music. None of the material featured here has been released before, and several of the projects have never released anything. In order of appearance, the projects featured are: shiggajon, oort trio, trulofa trio, rallemalle, ancestor, jon dræby, space continents, raphel mai amecche zabi almi, elektronavn, white moth, látzlò máa, mazurka, bm, drowning mountains, and al-ha-sheminit" (Golem)

George Ferguson McKeating 2cdr (Bells Hill) 5

Excellent double cdr compilation with proceeds going to Pancreatic Cancer Research Fund, in memory of George McKeating, father of the guy who runs the label. On this - Alex Neilson & Richard Youngs, Astral Social Club, Culver, Mirag, Hasan Gaylani, Jazzfinger, Vars of Litchi, Graveyards, Greg Kelley & Alex Neilson, Mechanical Children, Trauma, Blood Stereo and Hapsburg Broganza.

Hearing Music 3" cdr (CLaudia) 2

4 tracks based on field recordings which were originally issued on business card cdr. Jane Austen is first up - overheard piano lullabies in the room next door. Next comes C Cottrell with his hyper-real walk in the park - gulls squawk as if they're inside your head and the general rumble washes around everything else like a fast-running river.  Yek-koo's track loops home recordings into what sounds like looped bottle clang. Final track is a cut-up of Tokyo sporting life from Mark Sadgrove.

Imaginational Anthem IV 

• cd (Tompkins Square) 5
• LP (Tompkins Square) 6

Another excellent album of acoustic guitar pickers including C Joynes, Aaron Shepherd, Micah Blue Smaldone, William Tyler, Chris Forsyth, Sam Moss, Nick Jonah Davis, Pat O'Connell, Mike Fekete and Tyler Ramsey. Lots of names I didn't know prior to hearing this but lots I now want to explore further.

Inner Ends of the Coils 2cdr (Nothing Out There) 3.50

A lovely handmade double gatefold package for this compilation of guitar-based sounds: Ashtray Navigations, Sun Stabbed, Century Plants, RST, Michel Henritzi, Jeff Gburek, Savage Sons of Wallonie, Melmac, Gart & Seekatze, Przewalski's Horses, Guanaco, Michael Northern, Expo 70, Nappo, Poldr and Gunn Diehl.

"The official compilation that includes all the artists performing at the second annual Lal Lal Lal festival. 60 minutes of deep, uncensored and unreleased sounds by Sus & Jacob, Kiiskinen, Lussu & Pami, Benjamin Franklin, Good Band, Buffle, Kompleksi and Avarus!" (Lal Lal Lal)

Compilation LP / fanzine set. The LP features Akron / Family, Joane RObertson & Matthew Ashworth, WAND, Natural Snow Buildings Married in Berdichev, Noon Duo, The See See and Sea Dog. The zine features artwork by Jake Blanchard, Pete Fowler, Andrew Rae, Will Sweeney, Sarah King, Solange Gularte, James Trimmer / Mirt and Mat Pringle.

Thoughts From Screeching Lake cd (Singing Knives) 4

Another excellent compilation from the excellent Singing Knives label from Sheffield, UK. This features Harappian Night Recordings, Shiggajon, Pekko Kappi, Helhesten, Ross Parfitt, Serfs, Stephanie Hladowski, Ben Nash, A Wake, Dylan Nyoukis and more.

Wailing Bones Volume 3 cdr (Digitalis) 3

3rd in this superb series of compilations from Foxglove / Digitalis - ritualistic psych-folk jams from  Brothers of the Occult Sisterhood, heavy electronic blasts and e-bow doom from Apple Snails, primitive clatter and strum from the Serial Harvest (of the Funeral Folk collective) and dislocated drone from Seht

Wailing Bones Volume 12 cdr (Foxglove) 3

4 new long form tracks: 1st up Thousands with what sounds like a live track - it's a pretty loose jam anyway. The ever-excellent Tim Coster turns out another gem: a slowly unfolding piece of charged hum. Next up Australian Cameron Webb's Seaworthy with a beautiful piece of horizon-gazing guitar drift. And to round things off Anthony Guerra & Matthew Nidek with a superb guitar / drums improvisation that builds from something sparse into slashing chords with the rattling clatter of Nidek's drumming. an excellent cdr.

We Are All One, In The Sun: A Tribute to Robbie Basho LP (Alt Vinyl) 10.25

"We are All One, In the Sun: a Tribute to Robbie Basho, represents a humble tribute to this truly original and passionate American guitarist, musician and composer curated and realized by musician, producer, and acoustic guitar maker Buck Curran (who along with his wife Shanti performs as the duo Arborea).. This  collection of both original compositions and new interpretations of Basho songs befittingly begins with German guitarist and painter Steffen Basho Junghans, who has devoted almost 20 years to composing guitar music in the spirit of Robbie Basho. There is also a gorgeous composition by Glenn Jones, a friend of Basho and another musician who has dedicated his life to proliferated music composed on the Steel String guitar, and the young Irish guitarist Cian Nugent...who represents a new generation of guitarist-composers carrying on the torch. Meg Baird, Arborea and Fern Knight all represent beautiful female led vocal tributes to Robbie Basho compositions that feature his passionate and evocative singing. Curran's choice of female led vocal performances is a tribute honoring Basho's own profound spiritual reverence and fantastical love for women. Basho's own singing was said to have been first inspired by the beautiful and powerful voice of Peruvian soprano Yma Sumac. The choice of involving instrumentalists Rahim Alhaj and Helena Espvall in this project was simple, in that Curran feels Basho would have appreciated their roots, virtuosity, and passion and in their sound he also hears a kindred spirit linking all three musicians. Rahim AlHaj is a Grammy Nominated Iraqi born master of the Persian Oud. AlHaj, a student of the great Munir Bashir, exhibits great technique and a pure emotional style. Cellist Helena Espvall, a native of Sweden, represents a musician with a deep connection to her instrument, a musician who conjures up mysterious and emotionally charged improvisational music from bow and cello, music that is an amalgamation of sounds and textures from her travels all over the world. This record is also dedicated to the memory of Philadelphia based guitarist Jack Rose, who passed away too young (1971 to 2009) and who over the past decade created and recorded some of the most beautiful and powerful guitar music in the tradition pioneered by Robbie Basho. (excerpted from the original press release from Important Records)." (AV) 

Yr Agog cd (Oggum) 3

great compilation from a few years back with proceeds going to Welsh homeless charities: Longstone, Ectogram, Electroscope, Flying Saucer Attack, Magic Carpathians, Stylus, Nimbus 2000, Hydroplane and more

Dream Magazine #5 with cd 5

Interviews with Robert Wyatt, Julia Vorontsova, Tom Rapp, Ghost, Terry Riley, Kemialliset Ystavat, Marissa Nadler, Eclipse, Mats Gustafsson, Verdure, Sun City Girls, Jonny Trunk, Lost Domain, and more. Cd: Lost Domain, Volcano the Bear, Piano Magic, Julia Vorontsova, Jack Rose, Verdure and more.

"Awesome collection of psychedelic collage art by this Brooklyn based artist. A collection of mushrooms, skulls, aliens and eastern symbolism. As Jason says: “My work is about Being. Bright, colorful, paper collages functioning as the Mandala or the Yantra: a meditational tool aimed at self-discovery, spiritual awakening, and devotion to the Divine Being. Navigating Consciousness through laser beams, Shakti, and joy. Confronting Fear by maintaining a rigorous process, Kali, and death. Experiencing Harmony from symmetry, UFO’s, and the cosmos. Densely layered patterns, shapes, and line hold together deep, symmetrical spaces where mind and body potential is revealed and explored. In either case, an attempt to create a magic Sacred Space where our primordial questions about Being, co-exist with comic books, science fiction, Timothy Leary and Terrance McKenna. A magic Sacred Space where the divine mother goddess can just as easily caress and nurture you as ferociously rip your face off.” Full-colour cover and 18 pages b&w." (Sloow)

Beautiful new magazine by the immensely talented Iker Spozio. Issue # 1 includes interviews with Norman Jopling (one of the most important music journalists of the sixties), the Poets' George Gallacher (interview conducted by John Cavanagh), Sibylle Baier, the Peep Show's Stephen Morris and the Litter's Tom "Zip" Caplan.

Issue 2 of this very fine looking magazine by artist Iker Spozio in collaboration with Cecile Schott (Colleen). This issue features interviews with Michael Yonkers, Mike Raab (Jellybean Bandits), Mark Fry, Norman Jopling and Don Dexter (The Id). Throughout is featured Iker's fabulous illustrations. All copies come with a cd by Jellybean Bandits.