12K + LINE CDS NOW AVAILABLE FROM EXPERIMEDIA October 5, 2008

EXPERIMEDIA.NET
September 30, 2008
The Experimedia online mail order shop has recently expanded to include titles from fine select labels from around the globe. Titles are now available from 12k/line, Non Visual Objects, Room40, Audiobulb, Dragon’s Eye, Spekk, and/OAR, Gears of Sand…and more on the way from Nexsound, 1000füssler, and Infraction. These are some of our favorite labels here at Experimedia and we personally recommend all the titles we carry. Our goal with this expansion is to showcase and make conveniently available titles from our favorite labels in a single online ship. The list of labels we stock will surely grow and as time goes on we will post things such as featured releases/labels/artists, radio shows, profiles, news and updates from the labels we carry, and so on. Available throughout the shop are audio previews and third party reviews for most titles. We hope you will support Experimedia’s expansion into this territory.

PHOTOS FROM GLASGOW October 4, 2008

all photos by: Ramon Niemiec @ Stereo, Glasgow, UK

JODI CAVE

FOURCOLOR

FILFLA/MOSKITOO

FOURCOLOR + MOSKITOO +SAWAKO LIVE IN BROOKLYN + BOSTON October 4, 2008

Four Color + moskitoo + sawako
Oct. 20 (Mon) 4:00PM – 5:30PM FREE
David Friend Recital Hall @ Berklee College of Music
921 Boylston St. (Uchida Building) Boston, MA, 02215
(617) 266-1400

12k PRESENTS: Four Color + moskitoo + sawako
October. 21th (Tue) 8:00PM $10 at door
Issue Project Room
The (OA) can factory, 232 3rd street, 3rd floor, Brooklyn, NY 11215
http://www.issueprojectroom.org

“MIT OHNE” REVIEW ON TEXTURA October 3, 2008

http://www.textura.org/reviews/steinbruchel_mitohne.htm

Steinbrüchel: Mit Ohne
12k

Though presented here in audio form only, Mit Ohne is actually a collaborative work by Ralph Steinbrüchel and Yves Netzhammer, more specifically an audio-visual installation named “The feeling of precise instability when holding things” which was presented in 2003 at the Museum für Gestaltung in Zurich, Switzerland. In the display, Steinbrüchel’s sound pieces were synchronized to Netzhammer’s slowly mutating movements of 3D animation imagery. Even without the visual dimension (apparently a three-part projection was augmented by a multi-channel sound presentation), Steinbrüchel’s seven tracks—four of them less than two minutes each—suggest a sense of movement through geographical space, a feeling further reinforced by having each of the pieces flow uninterruptedly into the next.

In the first part, the soft patter of crystalline tones initially resembles drops in a puddle before elongating into a blurry whole. A swelling surge announces the onset of part two, after which bright melodic fragments shimmer and glisten in the third. Part four is the longest of the set and, more than any of the others, its droning layers of slow-motion tones encourage reflection. As the work moves towards its close, the static-laden and insistent sixth is capped by a serene seventh. Mit Ohne’s pretty drones of glistening tones and soft pitter-patter are exactly the kind of understated and polished sound sculpting one expects from 12k and, for that matter, the release wouldn’t sound put of place on ROOM40 either.

October 2008

AMPLIFIER MACHINE REVIEW ON THE SILENT BALLET October 3, 2008

Amplifier Machine are something of an anomaly in the Australian post-rock/experimental rock/instrumental rock/whatever-else-you-want-to-call-it scene. While solo experimental artists explore the more uncharted routes of guitar sounds, and dozens of bands combine elements of more conventional instrumental stylings, Amplifier Machine picks a space in between, using an ensemble setting in order to create guitar, piano, and drum based ambient post-rock. The three members of Amplifier Machine have their fair share of success as solo artists and in other bands: Seth Rees as a solo experimental guitarist and a member of the extremely loud The Spheres and duo I Want A Hovercraft, Alex Jarvis as a solo songwriter and in Registered Nurse, Black Cab, Automatic, and Fast Piss Blues Band, and James Dixon again as a solo artist and with bands Swordfish and Supergroop. The collaboration of these three minds is one of intriguing approach. In defining the way music would be created under the Amplifier Machine banner, the members settled upon “The Rule”: that when the other two members have settled, it’s your turn to change. Of course, this is going simply by the band’s biography, which itself has a tone of flippancy, but this idea certainly seems to have a place in Her Mouth Is An Outlaw.

The first release from Amplifer Machine was a split EP with a-mo. While a-mo’s side was a focused and well constructed, 8 minute, three track affair, Amplifier Machine gave up nearly 20 minutes of ambient soundscape that sounded like (and probably was) a cutout from a far longer jam session. As a result, these recordings came across as something of a disorganised mess, that wasn’t the most exciting piece of music around.It seems, from the effort put forth on Her Mouth Is An Outlaw, the flaws of the sound offered on the split have been cleaned up, with the presentation of a sound that is both engaging and unique.

The title track is the best example of where Amplifier Machine have improved on the previous effort. With the beautiful flow of a piano roll and a guitar line that lightly recalls Because of Ghosts, the rich but spacey 9-minute song moves through minimal, near-imperceivable change, to grow into a blooming, emotional piece that staves away from what seemed to be an alienation of the listener in previous releases.

While some pieces on the album are similar to the ambient soundscapes of the split, they are approached with a greater sense of progression. Shorter tracks “Into The Nearest Chair,” “Some Place Nowhere All The Time,” and “Up With The Curtain Down With Your Pants” are interpersed between the 7+ minute efforts, demonstrating the many characters of Amplifier Machine in a faithful light, exploring both the very extremes and the simplest of guitar sounds.

Her Mouth Is An Outlaw is Amplifer Machine’s sound presented with poise and balance, an attractively compiled consolidation to the best elements of the band’s sound. From the most chaotic to the calmest of formless guitar ambient sound, and tentative chordal analogue progressions, this album is a unique and beautiful experience.

-Marcus Whale