A quick round up on some of the radio appearances happening soon:
Stringmodulator on Grand Music for Tiny Souls (plus our Bearsuit friends Bunny & The Invalid Singers)
Stringmodulator on the Comfy Show (plus our good friend Jaime Munarriz):
t.r. hand on The Recognition Test (along with our friends Alwin van der Linde + {AN} EeL, Hans Castrup and Jaime Munarriz):
And finally… Stringmodulator were on the mighty BCfm again today. Listen again here:
September 10th sees the release of three special albums, all quite different but with a common theme running through them. We have…
Three melodic instrumental albums that nod towards krautrock and prog, with a raft of other influences. We’ll go into detail on these albums over the next couple of weeks, but first up a quick round up of some of the coverage of Stringmodulator.
We were delighted to get some pre-release airplay from the lovely Phil Vickery on his weekly In-Tune show on BCfm. Phil’s show is always essential listening and this was no exception. Listen again here:
https://bcfmradio.com/intune
The album also scored a fantastic review from the charming Michael Housel at his Bizarre Chats blog. Read it here:
https://bizarrechats.blogspot.com/2018/08/stringmodulators-manifesto-strikes.html
Everyone here at the Conning Tower was winding down, lowering the periscope, ready for the traditional English August of drizzle and traffic jams, when a most remarkable thing happened… a new EP from the reclusive guru of mind-training, self help/abuse and prison tattoos, t.r. hand, landed on the desk.
There’s a super-size serving of concept in the EP ‘The Checking’, and in addition to t.r’s trademark washes, sound collages, chops/screws and deep atmospherics, there are spoken vocal readings/recitals from Bonnie J. Currie which give the tracks a whole new focus and impetus. Once again t.r has coerced the Glove of Bones into producing the cover/track art and it is glorious.
After checking that the restraining order was still in place, and that our A&R man’s tetanus jabs were up to date, we set out to get an interview with t.r. hand in a disused warehouse. This is what happened:
SBC: Can you give some explanation of the ideas behind this work and its points of reference?
TRH: Have you been watching One Punch Man on Netflix? It’s like that. If you get an idea, the last thing you should do is grab it and choke the air out of it. Tickle it, ask it questions. Listen, don’t talk.SBC: There is a running theme in the work, a narrative. How did that come about?
TRH: From a broad suggestion. I didn’t choose it, other than signposting its huge source. I didn’t know the performer, nothing other than ‘some words’ was suggested.SBC: Did the narrative alter the project?
TRH: Yes.SBC: Can you explain?
TRH: No. Well, almost no. The grip on the idea wasn’t ever so tight that it couldn’t transform. Everything is transformation. A stick of charcoal in your fingers and a piece of paper. Both ask for transformation. When I received the narrative recordings they changed the project. Pretty much completely. The original project is probably flipping and flapping around somewhere waiting for an oxygen intake. Is that the natural selection of ideas? No idea. The critical thing though is I’d imagined some scattergun / sound bite content. That’s what I was geared up to work with. Bonnie’s work though was so full of understanding of the subject and passionate in it’s presentation, the original idea seemed trivial and it would have been wrong to strip it from it’s context and use little bits from here and there for effect or imposed meaning. I ‘get’ the source but of all the many words in books, this set are the most inviting for the imposition of personal meaning.SBC: For any readers out there, what is the source?
TRH: They are from the Red Book by Carl Jung. Look it up, it’s not easily summarised. Go with the flow. Pretty sure civilization will come back to it after the apocalypse.SBC: That isn’t very positive for a self proclaimed Guru?
TRH: Truth hurts, which probably explains the current global collision.SBC: In your somewhat small public scope, you do use the hashtag #guru. Do you have any reason or explanation of this?
TRH: There’s an underlying, no, overriding sarcasm in that question isn’t there? The ‘Self Help’ industry is on the ascent, most of it is lunacy. It’s all very tribal. So, I’m happy to hit up on a level playing field. I’m pretty much in the peace and love wing, anarchic, left leaning libertarian sect. It’s niche but I’m sure there’s an audience. Albeit briefly.SBC: Thank you.
TRH: Can I go now?
We are presenting The Checking as a digital download, or as a super-deluxe hardback book/CD package, including 24 pages of Glove of Bones’ designs. Both formats are available from the Bandcamp page.
Two releases this month, both somewhat unusual.
First up is the various artists compilation, Cottura 8 Minuti (or C8M). This is compilation of music made in, or at least centered around, the kitchen. We’d love to take credit for C8M, but the truth is the curation and heavy-lifting was done by Lezet and Razrook, both of whom appear on the compilation.
Lezet (Igor Jovanovic) says:
“Cottura 8 minuti – that’s a suggested time for preparing a meal (often printed on pasta package, spaghetti for instance).
Cottura 8 minuti (C8M) was also a suggestion for musicians and sound artists to contribute in gathering a collection of sound recordings that all originate from any sort of a kitchen (indoor, outdoor, home, restaurant etc.)
C8M – gave freedom to explore all kinds of kitchenish soundscapes. The performances (“cooking” the sounds, or other recording engagement in the kitchen, using kitchenware to produce sound, music, or even playing real instruments while cooking them in a stew…) don’t all last for 8 minutes, but we gave the artists strict instructions not to overcook it!”
As you might expect, C8M is predominantly experimental, containing generous servings of field recordings, noise, no-wave and treated sounds. Artists featured include Zumaia, Mean Flow, { AN } Eel , Gekkering, Awkward Geisha, Yann Pillas, David Nadeau, David Fenech and many more.
C8M is available as a digital download from Bandcamp, iTunes and Amazon, or on two CDs from Bandcamp.
All proceeds from C8M go to the Petar Radovanović Children’s Home, Užice, Serbia.
Our other release so far in August is a first for SBC, an album of remixes. We’ve taken Manipulant’s lovely single ‘What Good Are The Stars?’ and handed it out to a phalanx of musical luminaries and encouraged them to do unspeakable things with it.
Punningly entitled ‘The Stars Are Good… What?’, the album includes remixes from SBC ‘regulars’ Martin Neuhold, Alan Morse Davies, t.r. hand and Beltism, plus a plethora of guest artists new to the label: A Multitude of ONE, Cheddr, Stoneygate, Alex Hilliard with IE Unnoticed, Incentive, and Once & Future NoOne. It’s a fantastically inventive collection of remixes, ranging from the sympathetic through to complete re-workings.
‘The Stars Are Good… What?’ is available as a digital download or CD from Bandcamp. All proceeds go to the Make The World Better (MTWB) Foundation (Philadelphia). www.mtwb.org
After the madness that was May, it has been a blessed relief to release a mere two albums in June, but blimey Charlie, what a pair of albums they are!
First out of the traps was the second installment of Martin Neuhold & Friends ‘Dialogue’ series, cunningly entitled ‘Dialogue 2’. Like the first Dialogue album, these pieces were initially solo improvisations recorded by Martin as part of February Album Writing Month (FAWM); these were then added to, remixed and repurposed by a veritable phalanx of leading ambient and experimental musicians. Artists on this album include Cousin Silas, Jaime Munarriz, Wilfried Hanrath, Volker Lankow and many more.
As with the first volume, Dialogue 2 is available as download or CD and all proceeds go to Médecins Sans Frontières.
Our other new release in June was ‘Irresistible Forces’, our debut release for the renowned sound designer and electronic musician, Andrulian. As with several of our roster, Andrulian’s music has a healthy disrespect for genres, but if we had to call it we’d say ‘Irresistible Forces’ straddles the ambient/dark ambient/experimental categories.
Andrulian’s work is big on atmospheres, textures and details, and this album uses these to great effect on a collection of pieces, some of which are unsettling to the point of scariness. Perhaps listen with an adult initially.
The album has been picking up great reviews and some significant plays on influential web radio shows, so do lend it your ears.
‘Irresistible Forces’ is available to purchase from Bandcamp, iTunes, Amazon and Google Play.
It’s been super busy here at SBC for the past month or so, and we have snuck out a few releases with relatively little fanfare nor ballyhoo. So, let’s rectify that straight away.
Back at the beginning of May, we released the debut EP from the immensely talented singer/songwriter Sil Fiore, who performs under the name Sibilla. Here at SBC we pride ourselves on the variety on offer on our smorgasbord of delights, and Sibilla’s debut EP serves up some first-class songwriting, powerful blues-tinged emotive vocals and top musicianship, all with a slight lo-fi alt-pop sensibility. There’s also a blistering, ground-up reworking of the Bessie Smith classic ‘Long Old Road’.
At the opposite end of the conventional music spectrum is the new EP from We Do Not Exist. We Do Not Exist comprise Alan Morse Davies, of Truck Stop Rent Boy and GOATS fame, and Petridisch (also a one time TSRB collaborator, Bearsuit Records alumni and Vocaloid practitioner). Alan describes the EP as “a journey through challenges”. It’s experimental (as you might expect), but also accessible; it’s meditative, but also unsettling. All proceeds from sales go to Médecins Sans Frontières, so if you don’t buy it you are A Bad Person.
Mid-May saw the release of the first of Martin Neuhold & Friends’ Dialogue series. The origin of these pieces were solo improvisations recorded by Martin as part of February Album Writing Month (FAWM) that were then collaborated on by an army of like-minded ambient and experimental musicians.
Martin is the loveliest of people and an incredibly talented multi-instrumentalist and we’re so delighted that he’s chosen SBC as the netlabel for this work. There will be another two Dialogue albums released over the next couple of months.
Dialogue 1 is available as download or CD; again, all proceeds go to Médecins Sans Frontières.
The last releases in May were two space-themed albums.
The first of these was ‘Citadels in Space’ by Dynamo Snackbar.
One of the pleasures of the Klang release was the number of positive comments about the two Dynamo Snackbar tracks (and yes, there are still a few Klang CDs left, but don’t hang around) and this new album is equally brilliant.
Dynamo Snackbar’s music is generally somewhat genre-defying. Comprising two long-form tracks, this album is part krautrock, part space-rock, part prog… if you like Ozric Tentacles, Quark/Levitation-era Hawkwind, Tangerine Dream, Berlin school synths or Bill Nelson this is going to resonate with you.
The second of the space-themed releases was ‘Distress Call from Life Raft 13’ by Tim Kays.
This unique album is part ambient meditation and part historical document. Everyone has heard the famous line ‘Houston, we have a problem’; Tim’s album traces the events of the hours that followed Jack Swigert’s fateful words.
Using genuine NASA recordings, juxtaposed against a hypnotic ambient soundscape, Tim’s album works for both active or background listening. Tim’s album is available as a free download.
Blimey, do we have some exciting stuff for you this May! Yes, yes we do. It was rhetorical, hence no question mark. But before we can tell you about that, here is some news that JUST CAN’T WAIT!
Firstly, our very own Manipulant will be featured on The Comfy Show, on Radio Woking, tomorrow between 20:00 – 22:00 BST. The Comfy Show is always chock full of new and brilliant music and this month looks like it will be a doozy. Listen along here: radiowoking.co.uk/listen and get the full details and commentary here.
Then on Sunday, we’re delighted that Bunny & The Invalid Singers from our benefit album One String Inspiration will be featured on BBC 6Music on Stuart Maconie’s Freakzone, 20:00 – 22:00 BST. You can, as ever, listen live here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/6music
And if that wasn’t enough, Sunday is also the day for the Unexplained Sounds show, The Recognition Test, which this week features Hans Castrup, who you will recall from the Exhibition:Red compilation.
You can listen to The Recognition Test here: http://mixlr.com/unexplained-sounds/ – if you want to play along at home, listen live 21:00–22:00 UTC+02. Full details here.
It’s starting to get busy here at the Conning Tower, what with Exhibition and possibly Klang coming up, plus one secret project and two confirmed new artists. So, in our wisdom we decided to release three new works on the same day. You can thank us later. Anyway, we have pretty much something for everyone. Starting with…
We’ve been trailing the Manipulant EP for a while, but now it’s finally released. Manipulant is musician and singer David from Lancaster, Pennsylvania and had a lot of radio airplay with his previous Eclectro album. The new EP ‘perspective’ is a melodic slice of electro that ranges from funky to seductive to jazzy to dramatic. We’re pushing tracks like SandS and Shiveresque to the US university radio stations as we think they really stand up to mainstream radio exposure. You can buy ‘perspective’ from iTunes, Amazon and our Bandcamp store here:
Cousin Silas needs no introduction for fans of ambient music, and that makes it all the more pleasing that he has chosen to place another release with us. ‘Radio Galaxies’, as its name suggests is a collection of cosmologically-themed pieces. Long-form, and deliberately slow-paced and evolving, this is an album that needs to be wallowed in. ‘Radio Galaxies’ is available from our Bandcamp store:
GOATS is a brand new experimental project, comprising Alan Morse Davies (The Clock House, At Sea Records, Truck Stop Rent Boy), Ade Hodges and Declan Owen. The album, made up of five goat-themed titles, also features Neil Campbell of Vibracathedral Orchestra fame and Rene Kita. The music is experimental and ever-changing, challenging in places and accessible in others. The album is ‘name your price’ on Bandcamp but any money raised will go to Médecins Sans Frontières (MSF) so we hope you’ll give generously.
Friday 16th March saw the publication of our latest release, ‘Somacopia DeFacto’ by experimental artists Anthony Donovan and {AN} EeL (Neale D. Retke).
By turns playful and brutal, Somacopia DeFacto is an uncompromising journey into the psyche and is strictly for the adventurous. Fiercely experimental, the album comprises three parts, each made up of multiple sequences. If you are comfortable with the later works of Scott Walker or some of the Beefheart albums, give this a try.
So much news, so few typing fingers! OK, Exhibition. Exhibition is the name of our 2018 ‘open’ compilation. There are three strands to the compilation, Red, Green and Blue: Red is the most experimental and challenging, Green is predominantly instrumental or ambient, and Blue is rock, post-rock, pop, electronica and so on.
We’re accepting entries until the end of March, but at the time of writing we’ve had submissions from:
Manga Brothers
Cousin Silas
Merge
Alan Morse Davis
CJA Band
Spartan Jet-Plex
Carbonates on Mars
Autonomaton
precocious mouse
Zumaia
Ruido
Nurse Predator
Ian Haygreen
Rauppwar
Lucidbeaming
Earthborn Visions
Pisse Larve
Peri Esvultras
Noise Cluster
God Cancer
James Hoehl
Raas
3SBAT
Feasibility Study
Cosmic Colonel
Manipulant
Crayon Angels
ikjoyce
Almark
Lezet
Intersonic Subformation
Ryliss
Icy Rainbows
{AN} EeL/Christopher Petkus/Lorne Shapiro
t.r. hand
Hans Castrup
Mean Flow
Against Nature
The Moth Poets
The Blank Holidays
Shice Squad
Tim Kays
Somta
Bridget Wishart & The Band of Doctors
Arka Sengupta
BlindººCoyote
Hypercube & Mario Lino Stancati
Janusz Brudniewicz
It’s going to be huge! You can read the original blurb about Exhibition here.
