Octobird – AM Sessions

  • Beitrags-Kategorie:Releases

Hey there Earth Persons…I am very happy to announce that Octobird’s current release “AM Sessions” is available in the form of manifested electrical vibrations now. So go grab your (free) digital copy from Bandcamp.

Inspired by the recording workflow from the sessions with his like minded fella Vodor L. Zeck, Octobird got himself an 8-track digital recorder and startet jamming.

Similar to the recordings from the recent Tram Komputer Release, these jams reveal themselves more or less as a raw distillate from spontaneous sessions, driven by repetitive patterns, exuberant modulations and a midi clock. Recorded in a single run and shrunk down to a bearable size later on.

Like Dessert Sessions… but on Midi Clock.

Tentacle Loot #19 | Northern Ncounters – Steel City Records 1995​-​1997

“Northern Ncounters compiles the highlights of Steel City Records, home to the singular electronic music produced during the fertile but secluded techno golden age that took place in Hamilton, Ontario 1995-1997.”

When you experience this compilation, it quickly becomes clear that this is not a well-researched subcultural gem from the history of niche techno. These are contemporary witnesses, those who have been there and who look back on an imprinted fragment of their past with a well-deserved and balanced portion of nostalgia.

Over 12 tracks from the back catalog of the few main players from Steel City Records, we explore a pool of acid tracks that are as uncompromising as they are experimental, and to which the sweat of blurred Warehouse Club nights generated by them is still clearly attached.

Anyone who has ever stretched out their sensors between Detroit and Manchester cannot avoid recognizing musical parallels. However, these tracks are far too honest, truthful and stubbornly naive for a result of quotation and imitation. Rather, the same spirit speaks from them, which also drove the disoriented youngsters from Detroit and Manchester. For them (unlike 90s Techno  in Berlin, for example) the awakening of techno was not the soundtrack for (spiritual) liberation, but a tool of escapism from their bleak, industrially colored world. This can especially be recognized from the fact that these producers represented here were striving for a much more driving, minimalist and hypnotic sound. While there are excursions in typical Berlin high-speed techno from time to time (such as Opgang 2 “DeChirico”), the naive testing of musical limits infected by experienced freedom does not occur. These Tracks had a task, a clear function (and still do!)

The attached PDF Liner Notes are very much recommended and yet too quickly overlooked. In the brief history of Steel City Records and the associated techno enclave of Canada it becomes clear that Detroit and Manchester were indeed important cornerstones of the musical orientation. Pleasingly, the written transcript of the SCR history is not a hedonistic celebration of better days, but rather an honest review of missed opportunities, youthful egocentricity and loyalty to ideas. The explanations are also exciting as a contemporary document of the pre-Internet hypes, from a time when the social networking of different local subcultures was still so completely different from today. Especially since we are now at a point where the dream of the Internet as a tool for cultural independence has been swept away in many ways and we are once again asked to reinvent ourselves.

 Without a doubt, “Steel City Records 1995 – 1997” would be worth a vinyl release. But as usual you would probably have to seize the opportunity to create a musical hype. Maybe you should miss this chance a second time? I guess so!

Tentacle Loot #18 | The 36 Chambers of Danny Wolfers

Danny Wolfers, better known as Legowelt or Bontempi 666, Calimex Mental Implant Corp., Clendon Toblerone, Commanchee’s Revenge, Coverti World, Danny Blanco, Dickie Smabers & The Moerwijk Crew, Florenza Mavelli, Franz Falckenhaus, Gladio, House Of Jezebel, Jackmaster Corky, Klaus Weltman, Lords Of Midnite, Nacho Patrol, Nomad Ninja, Occult Orientated Crime, Phalangius, Polarius, R-Zone, Raheem Hershel, Ray Escortienda, Rising Sun Systems, Saab Knutson, Salamandos, Sammy Osmo, Satomi Taniyama, Seaside Houz Boyz, Smackos, Squadra Blanco, Star Shepherd, The Psychic Stewardess, Twilight Moose, Ufocus, Venom 18, Westside Box Savants is a man who needs no introduction, but a separate Wikipedia page.

 

Usually, if you are a musician with only half as many identities, you can be sure that you have lost any prospect of any kind of musical career. After all, the musical identity of one’s own alter ego is usually the creatorˋs greatest asset. And once a recipe has been found that will keep your place in the queue of abundance free, you have to stay tuned and repeat formula X-Y until you get bored and get back into freelance poverty.

So it seems that the only conceivable way to escape this creative one-way street is to have a musical output that a single imaginary identity simply cannot cope with on its own. Regardless of the question how a real person can handle this

… because Danny can.

Where (contrary to popular preferences) I enjoy to hear musicians like Kid606 or Mark Pritchard keep breaking their blueprints constantly and pushing me into completely new worlds of sound, the wondrous “Aha!” moment with Legowelt always arises when someone from my musical arena comes back to with something like: “Oh … yeah, that’s good shit, right ?! Thatˋs actually a Legowelt Track.”

All the more I blossomed through a random Bandcamp fanmail thing from Danny Wolfers, which (far too late) made me realize that another incredible treasure trove of musical parallel identities lives on his very personal Bandcamp site. And even more, mostly on a pay-as-you-please principle. While I recently bought one of the records listed there for a ridiculously low price on Discogs, I guess I will be busy looking at this level of musical effusion even approximately for quite a while now.

Overall, Danny Wolferˋs Legowelt Bandcamp site is a little bit of a personal cabinet of loving curiosities.

Among countless hand-painted, fluffy album covers that reflect a uniquely sympathetic, deliberately naive DIY ethos, circulating Tape Acid Jams and warm, analogue ambient treasures abound, which alternately plant stories of elephants in city parks, extraterrestrials in fast-food restaurants or retro-futuristic vampire societies in the listener’s imagination. And probably the greatest achievement of Danny Wolfers is that you can believe all of these stories. Because he believes in them himself. Because he chose to believe all of these stories. And so with each release you understand a little more that Danny is a great role model for the eternal child in us. Someone who takes well-groomed naivety and an exorbitant knowledge of kitschy micotrends of underground culture to create his dream worlds uninhibited. Someone who does not criticize or condemn exaggerated musical clichés like coolness, but simply soaks up everything and let his robots translate his own version of it.

Danny Wolfers, the man who makes music faster than others can hear it.

“Word.”

Octobird Salad #9 | Home is where your House is

Okay… easy, easy!

Let’s leave that headline in all its ambiguity regarding the state of the nation and devote ourselves to an extra large portion of escapism. It’s dream time, baby! Because dreaming is the only true alternative to Netflix these days. And Dream House was a genre long before Netflix was a clinically recognized addiction.

I’ve been a bit off lately from simmering velvety smooth track transitions. Instead, I was quite busy jacking up my own tracks to somehow work.

Without being among those who suddenly have a lot more time (but rather those who simply take their time) I was pretty intensely involved in expanding my own mixing and mastering skills. So why not just sprinkle one of my own compositions right at the beginning? Roughly mixed and not mastered at all, but laid back and totally unobtrusive.

With everything that follows, this seems to be more or less a Future Times Label Special. Which surprised me myself and was not on purpose at all. But I guess that’s exactly where the fine instinct of Future Times releases lies. A forward-looking sound aesthetic that uses sound colors that are already deeply rooted in our imagination. All covered with a fine digital pastel, to which we haven’t dedicated ourselves so meditatively to since New-Age Times. Rhythmically, on the other hand, these Tracks are always encouraged not to break the well-known patterns, but rather to prepare the listener patiently for some next-level experiences.

Our other companions also join this joy of playing. Among them Linkwood, who – in addition to his collaboration with Foat – recently rereleased his Disco-House masterpiece System. As well as His Master’s Voice, a fairly new pair of hands on the machines and, above all, someone who stands out in the continuing Electro trend with his excessive digressions. Not by reinventing the toolbox, but simply by completely doing his own thing. 1st class dreamer!

TRACKLIST

ARTIST
Neu Balance
Octobird
Garies
Outboxx
Linkwood & Foat
Dreems
Jeremy Hyman
Ov
His Master’s Voice
Diego
Bandhagens Musikförening

TRACK
Tread
Rubbing Fingers
Don Bongo
How You Know
Pressure
In The Jungle
Slide
Perc Song (Chords)
Taurus
Crack
Protokoll A

LABEL
1080p
unreleased
Future Times
Well Rounded Housing Project
Athens Of The North
Multi Culti
Future Times
Future Times
KCZMRK
Future Times
Northern Electronics

 

Octobird Salad #7 | Pacific Planets

I tend to go off topic. No 2020 dystopian megafuture, no winterly cold digital abysses. Instead: Which instrument would you bring on a desert island? … on a strange planet … to communicate with people there … or at least to just hang out and watch the two moons …

…fairly stoned.

In the variety of experimental house music, a handful of artists have emerged in recent years, who have given a very own coloring to the washed-out concept of world music. Far from squeezing cultural assets of non-Western cultures into banging club tracks, but also from subordinating themselfes musically to the researched cultural heritage in false humility by simply creating a prettied blueprint. Instead they trace back their own club culture as a contemporary kind of rite and ecstasy to the origins of this music, which functions far from egocentricity and self-expression. Be it as a musical concept or just as an ingredient in experimental club music.

Probably the most consistent in this ranks are Don’t DJ (which I unfortunately stupidly DJed twice in this set … sorry; /). With their percussive polyrhythms and impulsive monotonous structures, they build bridges between non-western tribal music and the raw idea of techno. The 12th Isle label preferably uses color palettes and publishes wonderfully quirky tracks, impregnated with pale pastel memories from a imaginary Caribbean vacation in 1974(ish). And then there are formations such as Groupshow (with Jan Jelinek), Tru West or even Transllusion that are deeply influenced solely by their clearly audible improvisational character.

TRACKLIST:

Dices, AEM Rhythm Cascade
L/F/D/M
RAMZi
Don’t DJ
Pavel Milyakov
Beta Librae
Kassem Mosse
Don’t DJ
Groupshow
Healing Force Project
Galaxian
Transllusion
Tru West

Pacific
Untitled (Blue)
Fly Timoun
Repercussion
Silent Elektro
Speedway
Chilazon 2
Syrian Rue
Pet Hair Magnet
Alternative Currents
Forget About It
Moment 4
Chasing The Loophole In A Relentless Spiral Of Self-indulgence

12th Isle
Clan Destine Records
12th Isle
Berceuse Heroique
ГОСТ ЗВУК
1080p
Honest Jon’s Records
Berceuse Heroique
Staubgold
On Board Music
Foul-Up
Clone Aqualung Series
Marmo Music

“Tram Komputer” out on Zanderhythm

Tram Komputer is the first compilation put together from a vast number of eight-track-sessions recorded at Vodor L. Zeck‘s Studio over the last five years. On a regulary basis Vodor L. Zeck, DBH and Octobird (and who ever else wanted to join in) came together, simply to create portions of energy made with electronic machines, press record and catch some magic.

The tracks captured on this tape were cut and edited as less as possible and then mastered by Octobird. While all these sessions over the years spit out a vast variety of sounds and styles ranging from Hi-Speed Acid to Trippy Downbeats to Speed-Ambient, this first release represents the more melodic Brain Raves.

A special note of thanks also goes out to Vertical67 for the Tape Cover Design visualizing the different Tram stations it took to get to the Zanderythm studio in Berlin Marzahn.

“Organelle” EP out on Pr0gramma Records

  • Beitrags-Kategorie:Releases

And yet another EP (or what ever you call 6 tracks in a row these days) out on Pr0gramma! It feels just great to be in such good creative company. This time even with some visual gems. Pr0gramma Number one Ismael Stein made a fantastic little collage with memories of a forgotten future.

“Organelle drives in and out of a polar spectrum: the shadowed, looping post-industrial grit of Treevolt and the more luminous, organic left field of Woodrough. The area between these aesthetic pillars makes each juncture that much more unique. The ebbs and flows somehow follow a natural trajectory despite being far from predictable making for 34 dense minutes that never overstay their welcome. The staple dissonant riffs, busy perc, and tasteful bridges all remain intact, but in evolution from Octobird’s last, Baikonur, Organelle seems to retain and build with a more concretely directed pace driving each listen through a more diverse myriad of textures and seemingly very real places yet all with an oddly particular fidelity that suggests some weird sense of omnipotent control.”

Tentacle Loot #8 | Oxvac – Partials

As part of the American electronic music collective Pr0gramma Oxvac has been releasing his music since about 2015.

On his latest release “Partials” he clearly demonstrates references to abstract rhythm constructs as they were cited by greats like Autechre in the Warp era . However, he neither tries to make himself comfortable in homage nor in practising some kind of beatmashing-competition but adds a very personal coloring. Which, in its warmth, happily stands out from the cold, mathematical IDM sound. The warm analog origin of the modular system responsible for most of the synth sequences is clearly audible and the background noise that accompanies us throughout the whole album sets itself like a little piece of meadow under the tracks so that the organic melodies may writhe on it. The beat structures also seem to hover between complex patterns and a wide-breathing 4/4 bass drum.

So yet again another happy accident to find such beautiful electronic music from the U.S. of A. From this side of the Atlantic’s perspective I can  just say it’s nice that you’re no longer necessarily get overpowered by EDM-Metal-Dubstep, but can also lift the actual treasures (which have always been there!). At least on platforms like Bandcamp and Co.

Sunken Treasures #1 | Patrick Vian – Bruits Et Temps Analogues

When I first became aware of Patrick Vian’s album
Bruits Et Temps Analogues by it’s release on Staubgold Records, I was not aware that this was a 1976 reissue because Vian’s expeditions to the soundscapes of jazz, fusion, electronica are so timeless and cross-genre.

In each of his titles, he builds up picturesque arrangements with the help of analog synthesizers, field recordings, percussion and all sorts of exotic instruments which never quite engage in classical song or instrumental structures, but always wavering towards an unique idea. Here and there it gets quite funky and you wait for the drums to go on the one, but Vian refuses the easy way, creating unique timeless sound paintings.

So, if you haven’t been travelling in a while, that’s the perfect Album to do so.

Inhalts-Ende

That's the bottom of the sky.

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