ADAMS, JOHN Violin Concerto / Shaker Loops (Nonesuch) cd 16.98

ADAMS, JOHN LUTHER In The White Silence (New World) cd 16.98
Oooh. So utterly blissful, beautiful, and contemplative. In The White Silence is a musical evocation of the endless white Arctic tundra. John Luther Adams lives in Alaska and this piece, like much of his work, is inspired by the remote Alaskan wilderness, in all its vastness and stillness, what he considers exploration in "sonic geography". We thought at first that sounded like it might be a bit too New Agey or something but as soon as we heard this we couldn't help but fall in love with it!
This was recommended to us by one of our customers who said that it was basically the closest any modern composer had come to making "Pop Ambient" music (as in, the Pop Ambient compilations released by the Kompakt label, stuff like Gas, Markus Guentner, and Klimek). But it's not electronic, it's chamber music, performed by the Oberlin Contemporary Music Ensemble. That means lots of sweet strings -- violins, violas, cellos, bass, harp. Also some additional coloration (and this is colorful, in the way that white is all colors) from vibraphone, celesta and orchestra bells. Although of course this composition has a beginning and an end, it seems like something that could go on forever, though it really only lasts about 75 minutes -- slowly unfolding, built from layers of cloud-like tone clusters and barely-shifting rhythms. The musically learned liner notes (which will tell you a lot more about the musical theory behind the construction of this piece than I could ever hope to do) speak of "static textures of densely layered sound, sustained tones, short repetitive patterns, and long rising and falling lines." All true, but you have to hear it to understand how NICE that can be. If the Arctic really sounds like this, we're all set to fly up there and strap on the snowshoes... A gorgeous, extended, and immersive piece of minimalist, "pop ambient" chamber music indeed!!
MPEG Stream: "Letter F"
MPEG Stream: "Letter L"

ADAMS, JOHN LUTHER Red Arc / Blue Veil (Cold Blue Music) cd 14.98
We've always loved the blissful and beautiful work of John Luther Adams, one of the great American modern composers. His album In White Silence is a bonafide all time AQ favorite but truth is, Adams has plenty of other records that are equally worthy of our attention. Red Arc / Blue Veil blew us away the first time we heard it as it shows a much more intense side to the Alaskan composer then we were accustomed to. Yes, it's still stunningly crisp and beautiful, but there is a velocity and urgency to this work that struck us immediately. In some ways this is the darkest recording we've heard from Adams, yet within this music, there is still a shining mystical light beaming so brightly. Whether it's the dueling pianos in "Dark Waves" or the monumental bass drums pounding to the heavens in "Qilyuan" or the majestic vibes and keys that close out the record on the title track "Red Arc/Blue Veil", Adams has created a piece of music that demonstrates again that as a supposedly "academic" or "modern classical" composer, he's capable of creating some of the most beautiful and sublime sounds imaginable, regardless of genre.
MPEG Stream: "Red Arc/Blue Veil"
MPEG Stream: "Qilyuan"

ADAMS, JOHN LUTHER Strange and Sacred Noise (Mode) cd 16.98
Percussion-centric composition from the guy who brought us the lovely In The White Silence.

ALMURO, ANDRE Depli (Elica) cd 16.98
"Depli" marks the first CD release of the little known French composer who had spent time working with Bernard Parmigiani at INA-GRM as well as in radio aproductions with Andre Breton and Jean Genet. "The three pieces on this album span a fourteen year period of Almuró's recent musical production: 'Le Troisème Oeil' (1991) is a 28 minute dynamic and deceivingly cosmic piece for clashing and screeching electronic bodies... 'Terrae incognitae' (1978) is a 36 minute eerie and ritualistic tour-de-force for sixty-member chorus, recorded live at its animated and scandal-stirring premier in the Notre-Dame Church in Caen. 'Boomerang, Prelude' (1979) is a dark and brooding 12 minute electronic composition also performed live surrounded by iron fences and road cones, big standing mattresses and a whole tree hanging upside down."

AMBER ASYLUM Still Point (Profound Lore) cd 12.98
Esteemed chamber music goddess Kris Force returns with what is quite possibly her most stark compositions to date. She's joined by some of the Bay Area's finest and most beloved of the indie metal and rock community including John Cobbett (Hammers Of Misfortune, Ludicra), Jackie Perez-Gratz (Grayceon), Tim Green (The Fucking Champs, Concentrick), Lorraine Rath (The Gault), and Sarah Schaffer (The Gault, Weakling). Still Point begins with three songs that slowly drift in on droning strings (violin, viola and cello) and ghostly choral vocals. From there the gothic proceedings build gradually with the entrance of minimal piano, guitar, flute, trumpet and percussion. As always, absolutely haunting and stunningly gorgeous!
MPEG Stream: "In The Still Point He Remains"
MPEG Stream: "Black Phoebe"
MPEG Stream: "The Summation"

ANZELLOTTI, TEODORO Domenico Scarlatti (Winter & Winter) cd 16.98
Adventurous accordionist Teodoro Anzellotti has already adapted the piano music of Erik Satie for another Winter & Winter disc. Now he turns to the harpsichord music of Italian composer Domenico Scarlatti, who flourished in Spain 1685-1757. Scarlatti's music blends the most modern, courtly music of his time with the ancient rustic gypsy folk tunes of the Iberian peninsula. Anzellotti's virtuosic accordion interpretations are delightful and colorful.

ANZELLOTTI, TEODORO Erik Satie (Winter & Winter) cd 16.98
Satie wonderfully adapted for accordion!!

APOCALYPTICA Cult ( Spitfire) cd 16.98
We listed this back on #108, when it first came out as an import (we were stocking the Canadian version, thanks to our friends at Scratch Records in Vancouver who ordered 'em for us and smuggled 'em down here) but it's taken over a year for this to get a proper US release. We never were able to get enough of the import to make a big deal about it, but now that it's out domestically we're ready to give this the big push -- it's one of the best "metal" albums of the year, despite not having a single electric guitar anywhere on it! This is what we said about it before:
We've been huge fans of this Finnish all-cello quartet for a while now, and how could we not be? Their first record was of them sawing away at all Metallica covers! Their second record was almost all covers too, not just Metallica, but Sepultura and Faith No More. It's not all that surprising that these pseudo classical instrumental versions of metal songs worked so well (sometimes better than the originals), especially considering the epic Wagnerian quality of a lot of metal, especially Metallica.
On their third record though, Apocalyptica have almost completely abandoned their metal/Metallica covers (except for a couple bonus tracks) in favor of originals, and the result is probably their best record yet. They have obviously learned all they can from the masters (classical and metal), and have struck out on their own, to create something new, certainly not conventionally metal, but not classical either. Definitely 'heavy' though! The four cellists (here augmented by double bass and all sorts of percussion) craft explosive and complex, super intense epics, fusing classical movements with traditional song structures, bizarre techniques with impeccable chops, all delivered with decidedly un-classical aggression, making for a record way heavier and better than anything Metallica themselves have done in the last few years. Not bad for a bunch of cellists!
This new US edition is a little different than the import -- the bonus tracks are the same (two Metallica covers plus their version of Grieg's "Hall Of The Mountain King"), but they've also included a new version of their song "Path" that adds vocals from the woman from the band Guano Apes (who I guess are popular in Europe), and there's also a cd-rom video included for that same cut. While it's neat to see them flailing away at their cellos in the stylish video, if you already have the import it's not enough to make you trade it in for this version. But if you *don't* have the import (and we know quite a few of you missed out), now's your chance to pick up this awesome album!
(Oh, quick note to the people who write press sheets for Spitfire: "Hall Of The Mountain King" is NOT a Savatage cover, guys!)
RealAudio clip: "Path"
RealAudio clip: "Pray!"
RealAudio clip: "Struggle"

APPLETON, JON & DON CHERRY Human Music (Water) cd 16.98
We love the out-there improvs of legendary jazz trumpeter Don Cherry, and the idea of him teamed up with an equally out-there electronics maverick (Jon Appleton, natch) was enough to get us excited about this cd reissue of the duo's 1970 recording Human Music. Cherry, then a fixture on the NYC free jazz scene, was invited to be an artist-in-residence by young Dartmouth music professor Appleton -- who just happened to have a Moog-laden electronic music studio at his disposal. The resulting collaboration is an early exercise in "live" electronic-meets-acoustic music -- as the studio techniques of musique concrete, like splicing and editing tapes with razor blades, couldn't be applied to a real-time improv duet, so Appleton had to find ways for Cherry's playing (on both horns and sundry percussion) to immediately "trigger" responses from the studio's arsenal of synths. The results are VERY bleepy-blurpy-whooshy, like something from a freaky sci-fi soundtrack, and Cherry's trumpet is often obscured by the electronic effects. We can't say that Human Music is an absolutely essential Don Cherry album but it's definitely an interesting novelty in his discography and it's cool to get to hear it now!
MPEG Stream: "BOA"
MPEG Stream: "OBA"

AQUARIUS BUTTONS 2 x 1" buttons 1.00
Hey, we just got another batch of AQ buttons made up...
Spread the word! Show the world your true aQ colors! COOL COOL COOL aQ buttons, now in 5 different vibrant color combinations. 4 new color combos (blue on pink, red on black, dark blue on blue, and yellowish green on dark green) and a popular one we had previously (brown on yellow).
TWO FOR $1!!! Colors are random, but buy enough and you'll be guaranteed to get 'em all! And of course all feature our spiffy James Gang style logo!! So stylish!

ARNALDS, OLAFUR Eulogy For Evolution (Erased Tapes) cd 17.98
That magical air in Iceland continues spawn some of the most soaring and beautiful sounds found anywhere on the globe. At just 21 years old, Olafur Arnalds is emerging as a strong voice in a new wave of modern classical inspired majestic sounds. On this, his debut full length, he employs strings, piano, guitar, organ, melodica and subtle ambient electronics at times, to create incredibly rich and lush sounds. Inspired by everyone from Eric Satie, to John Luther Adams, Kronos Quartet to the Rachels and even Godspeed You Black Emperor, as well as, of course, his countrymen Sigur Ros who he's often perfromed with live. Somber and elegant and packaged beautifully with artwork that compliments the kind of fragments of memory his beautiful music evokes.
MPEG Stream: "1953"
MPEG Stream: "3326"

ASANO, KOJI Flow-Augment (Solstice) cd 14.98
Japanese experimental music wunderkind Koji Asano has already produced a slew of fine albums that range in focus from guitar noise-rock to meditative piano improvisation to electronic soundscapes... Now, with this release, he ventures into the realm of modern classical, with three long tracks of melancholy and unsettling yet not-unmelodic music for strings, performed by the Koji Asano Ensemble (piano, cello, viola, violin, and contrabass). Koji Asano is perhaps Japan's answer to the United States' own prolific and multitalented new music prodigy Jim O'Rourke (and Asano has yet to release any dubious "pop" music). Recommended.

ASANO, KOJI Sanctuary On Reclaimed Land (Solstice) cd 16.98
Man, we've got some catching up to do. Since we last listed anything from prolific AQ-fave Koji Asano (that'd be 2002's Octopus Balloons), the Japanese avant-composer has moved from Barcelona back to Japan, gotten married, had a baby, and somehow managed to record and release another NINE albums. He's up to his thirty-seventh release now!! Dunno if we're gonna manage to retrospectively, individually review all of 'em but we'll at least try to get back with the program by presenting to you now numbers 36 (Sanctuary On Reclaimed Land) and 37 (Takoyakikun). We do, however, also have a couple copies each of The Giant Squid, Gondola Odyssey, Piano Suite Vol. 1: Fitness Club No. 1-20, Absurd Summer, Suite For Organ And Recorders No. 1: The Alien Power Plant, Zoo Telepathy, and Wind Gauge in stock for any fellow Asano enthusiasts that need to complete their collections right now.
Anyway, Sanctuary On Reclaimed Land is definitely still the Koji Asano music we know and love. Recorded as part of an installation in an empty warehouse on the Osaka waterfront, literally a "sanctuary on reclaimed land", this 51 minute piece is the sound of the interaction of a grand piano with a computerized sound system inside the echoing interior space of the warehouse. Notes played on the piano were amplified, reflected, and reproduced via computer processing and multiple microphones and speakers. Asano says he "received the inspiration of moisture and the sea breeze, while vibrating the Osaka harbor warehouse by a large volume and ... completed a large integrated work of the grand piano and computer sound". The results are a gorgeous ambient drone piece, that sounds not unlike Wolfgang Voigt's work as Gas. We've always enjoyed Koji's various piano-based projects (discs like Preparing For April, The End Of August, You Cannot Open The Door Because It Is Already Open, and January Rainbow) and this one belongs in that bunch, but at the end of a continuum where the piano as an identifiable sound source is almost entirely abstracted. Very nice.
Instead of the cardboard sleeves of most of his recent releases, this (and Takoyakikun too) comes housed in Asano's newest style of cd packaging, a plastic, sort of cd-sized dvd case.
MPEG Stream: "Sanctuary On Reclaimed Land (excerpt)"

ASANO, KOJI Spherical Moss Factory (Solstice) cd 14.98
With album number 26 in his rapidly expanding discography, Japanese experimental composer Koji Asano switches from packaging his cds in jewel cases to putting them in slim cardboard sleeves. He tells us that the reason for this change is in part because of a dream he had, about how his ancient Barcelona flat would collapse under the weight of all those jewel cases when he reached his hundredth release! And he's over a quarter of the way there already, so that's a real concern...
This 72-minute "Spherical Moss Factory" disc continues Koji's interest in high-end (shrill) sonic explorations, being a piece in two parts written for violin and contrabass, performed by the Koji Asano String Ensemble, which consists of Tomomi Tokunaga and Kentaro Suzuki on those instruments respectively. But the first few minutes of track one don't betray the stringed instrument sound source, as the near-inaudible scrape of Tomomi's violin starts things off in what sounds like an emulation of the sine-wave electronics of Sachiko M. But soon the listener realizes that this is no computer processed piece, but an avant-classical composition featuring real human musicians on acoustic instruments. Track two displays quite a bit more energy from the get go, as Tomomi saws away on her violin with abandon, before relaxing and entering into a duet with Kentaro's deep contrabass bowing. All throughout both tracks, the violin and contrabass together trade mournful moans in a melodic (if melancholy) mode, punctuated by frenzied scrabblings. We may not be season ticket holders to the symphony or 20th/21st century classical experts, but we know what we like, and we do like this.
RealAudio clip: "Spherical Moss Factory pt. 2"

ASANO, KOJI Takoyakikun (Solstice) cd 14.98
Man, we've got some catching up to do. Since we last listed anything from prolific AQ-fave Koji Asano (that'd be 2002's Octopus Balloons), the Japanese avant-composer has moved from Barcelona back to Japan, gotten married, had a baby, and somehow managed to record and release another NINE albums. He's up to his thirty-seventh release now!! Dunno if we're gonna manage to retrospectively, individually review all of 'em but we'll at least try to get back with the program by presenting to you now numbers 36 (Sanctuary On Reclaimed Land) and 37 (Takoyakikun). We do, however, also have a couple copies each of The Giant Squid, Gondola Odyssey, Piano Suite Vol. 1: Fitness Club No. 1-20, Absurd Summer, Suite For Organ And Recorders No. 1: The Alien Power Plant, Zoo Telepathy, and Wind Gauge in stock for any fellow Asano enthusiasts that need to complete their collections right now.
Takoyakikun is a bit of a departure for Asano, or maybe a return to his roots. For one thing, it's not one long, cd-length track, but several different, individual songs. Songs? Well, instrumental rock numbers anyway. Yes, rock. Or avant-rock, or prog-rock, or something. And, unlike most of his releases which are solo recordings (or sometimes string ensembles), this is a band project -- the very same band with which he made one of his first discs, Gravity.
Maddeningly convoluted and repetitive at times, this is choppy, angular, occasionally melodic, no-wave instrumental improv prog from a trio of guitar, keyboards and drums (Asano being the guitarist). We think folks into other skronky underground Japanese prog-core acts like Ruins and Korekyojinn would find this of interest... The keys definitely give it a "classic" prog vibe, and there's even a drum solo in track five! Recorded in 1997 (and released as a cd-r only at the time) now Asano has remastered and repackaged Takoyakikun for a proper cd release on his Solstice label.
MPEG Stream: "Takoyakikun track 1"
MPEG Stream: "Takoyakikun track 2"
MPEG Stream: "Takoyakikun track 3"

ASHLEY, ROBERT Dust (Lovely Music) 2cd 28.00
This record really just makes me mad. Robert Ashley has composed "Dust" to be a polemic on the lost conversations of homeless men and women. It's not really clear if Ashley's lyrical content is the collected results from homeless poets or if it is Ashley's fictionalization of the plight of the homeless. But the potential for the class-based argument that a wealthy white man fabricated his own stories of what it means to be homeless is the least of his problems. First off, this patronizing piece of high moralism falls not far from those classic ABC after school specials on why taking acid is deadly. Secondly, I don't know which crappy poetry slam Ashley picked Jacqueline Humbert from, but her perfectly groomed speaking voice trying to mimic Laurie Anderson has got to go. Thirdly, why the hell has Ashley turned to this tepid new ageist ambient, after his "Automatic Writing" stands as one of the eeriest pieces of academic compositions? Fourth, when will the "conceptual" community learn that aesthetics can never be forgotten whenever a concept is presented in a public forum? I'm choking on my own rage now.

ASHLEY, ROBERT Wolfman (Alga Marghen) cd 16.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
This is one of three separate shards of electronic music history (Ashley, Neuhaus, and Palestine) recently unearthed by Italian audio archaeologists Alga Marghen.
"Wolfman" collects four pieces circa 1957-1964 by American original Robert Ashley, a composer known for his releases on Lovely Music. Noisy tape-music and electronics to accompany equally extreme vocal performances. Pretty wild, and hard to take, certainly pioneering stuff!
MPEG Stream: "The Wolfman"

ATCHLEY, KENNETH Fountains (Auscultare) cd 12.98
Kenneth Atchley is a little known composer with connections to the Mills College Center for Contemporary Music (a couple of performances and a composition that has appeared on Chris Brown's web 'hub'), yet his "Fountains" piece is miles above the digital splutter that Mills has been promoting in the name of indeterminant composition and computerized improvisation. Atchley based the 3 compositions of this album on the digital synthesized contact microphone recordings of simple fountains pouring water into 40 gallon steel trash cans. The first piece ("fountain_1999.20") is a fractured collage in which passages of those water fountains in various states of augmentation jump cut between each other after several minutes, sounding much more like a late '80s collage from the Hafler Trio than anything recently coming from Mills. "fountain_1998.3" takes an oversaturation approach by amplifying the sounds into dense distorting layers much in the same way as Francisco Lopez' intensely loud moments. His most recent composition "fountain_2001.5" is the weakest of the three, sounding most like the Mills penchant for recognizable granular synthesis filters and flanges, though this one is the most adventurous composition with cutting from the dramatic sustained noise passage immediately to quiet water drips.
Released on Randy Yau's immaculately designed Auscultare Records.
RealAudio clip: "Fountain_1999.20"
RealAudio clip: "Fountain_1998.3"

BAKER, JOHN The John Baker Tapes, Volume 2 (Trunk) cd 16.98
Volume number Two of BBC Radiophonic workshop guru, John Baker's amazing recorded output. This time focusing on his jazz compositions, homemade electronic experiments and library music, most of it largely unheard. Less small themes and interludes than volume one, which also means less of what he made exclusively for the BBC. But that should not deter the BRW fanatics out there from picking this up. It's even stranger because it's so varied, covering his entire musical career from 1954 up until his death in 1985. Exhaustively culled from boxes and boxes of often unmarked tapes, there's homemade musique concrete pieces made early in his musical development, as well as his early recordings with a jazz combo. The jazz and library compositions (made for the Southern and Peer International organizations) are similar in form and sound to Basil Kirchin and Michael Garrick (two other Trunk luminaries), urgently spright and pastoral, sometimes soft and spacey. There is also soundtrack music for an early Ridley Scott short film, Boy on A Bicycle, and advert music, one of which we suspect the group Broadcast must have been very aware of ("Jazz Advert"). A great and essential companion to Volume One, and for anyone interested in early British electronic music.
MPEG Stream: "Requioso "
MPEG Stream: "Jazz Advert"
MPEG Stream: "Power Source "
MPEG Stream: "Pot's 'n'Pans"
MPEG Stream: "Piano Strokes"

BANG ON A CAN Meets Kyaw Kyaw Naing (Cantaloupe) cd 17.98

BASTIEN, PIERRE Visions Of Doing (Western Vinyl) cd 14.98
Oooh. We're always excited about any new releases from French automated-instrument builder and trumpeter Pierre Bastien. How often do we get records featuring music made (in part) by robots? Not often enough. And such lovely music too. All these tracks were originally composed as soundtracks to projects by a Dutch experimental filmmaker by the name of Karel Doing (hence the title). But Bastien's music so readily stokes the imagination than Doing's cinematic visions are not necessary accompaniment.
We said 'automated-instrument builder', those instruments being what Bastien calls his 'Meccano', simple sound-making robots or kinetic sound sculptures, that make looping music box melodies and provide a backing of slow, steady mechanical clank for Bastien's own wheezing, muted trumpet. Bastien plays in a smokey jazz mode, breathy, beautiful, oh so melancholic, that in the this context reminds us of Chet Baker in some sort of Tom Waits-ish instrumental junkyard. The gamelan or thumb piano like plinkings of Bastien's Meccano - exotica for scrappy homebuilt robots - are rendered somehow more human by the sweet sighs of Bastien's trumpet. He also makes use of field recordings, unidentified underwater warblings, and other mysterious textures in constructing these tracks. Wonderful stuff, so languid and relaxed and full of life, animated indeed by Bastien's Visions Of Doing. Bastien's previous discs for Rephlex, and others, have all been 'late night faves' here at AQ, and this latest gentle gem from Bastien joins them for sure.
MPEG Stream: "The American On The Highway"
MPEG Stream: "Visions Of Shanghai"
MPEG Stream: "The Thermodynamic Orchestra"

BATAGOV, ANTON The Wheel Of The Law (Listen Different) 3cd 38.00
We first listed this late last year, and it was a HUGE hit around here, but before we knew it all of our suppliers were out of it and we were unable to get more, waiting for copies to make it here all the way from Russia! Well, it's a few months later and we finally got enough to re-list! So those of you who slept on this the last time get another chance to pick up this gorgeous chunk of dreamy minimalism...
This is not actually new, but this is the first time we've been able to get this, and the moment we heard it, we knew it was something we had to list! Recorded in 1999, and orginally released in 2002, The Wheel Of The Law compiles three epic pieces of gorgeous minimalism from Russian composer Anton Batagov. Three discs, three tracks composed for organ, glockenspiel, xylophone, piano and percussion, inspired by Buddhism and the Quest for Nirvana, and the practices involved: peace, meditation, deep thought, breathing, conciousness. Repetitive and melodic, lush and so so beautiful. Someone once referred to Batagov as sounding "like Reich on vodka", not sure we hear the vodka, or even any sounds distinctly and immediately recognizably Russian, but there is certainly plenty of Reich here, as well as Riley, and most definitely some Harold Budd, especially in the delicate, spare piano arrangements. The first disc, "Circle Of Time" is four long movements of warm rich swells of organ, flowing lazily beneath delicate cyclical chimes and abstract piano figures, very dramatic and hypnotic. The second disc, the 4 track Voidness cycle: "Appearances And Voidness", "Clarity And Voidness", "Bliss And Voidness", "Mind And Voidness", introduces the same delicate chimes found on the first disc, but this time over a repeating series of haunting moaning violin melodies. Minor key and mildly atonal, the melodies are spread out over a spare background of complex overtones, all drifting dreamily into space. The final disc: "Liberation Through Listening In The Between" is again a massive sprawl of lush static organ drones, wavering and subtly pulsing, with simple three and four note melodies played out over minutes instead of seconds, chiming and ringing, resonating above the organ's mesmerizing drone, the whole thing supported by a barely there framework of simple percussion, so subtle and simple that it's basically a single drum, muted and way down in the mix, offering a sort of pulse for the piece, a musical heartbeat, slowed down, as if in meditation or contemplation.
So completely an utterly breathtaking.
MPEG Stream: "Dus-Kyi Khor-Lo 1"
MPEG Stream: "Dus-Kyi Khor-Lo 4"

BATTIATO, FRANCO Pollution (Water) cd 15.98
Although it's only a very small section inside our store, many of our most devout and curious shoppers have found gem after gem in our Italian Prog section. Franco Battiato is one of those gems for sure. One of those endlessly creative artists who completely defies categorization. Sweeping in scope and eccentric in all the right ways it's no surprise that Battiato has finally begun to get the attention he so rightly deserves, as folks like Jim O'Rourke have gone out of their way to champion these forward thinking sounds from decades ago. Released in 1973, Pollution is a psychedelic synth masterpiece foreshadowing so much of what was to come in the landscape of electronic music. With out-of-this-world synths that make Rick Wakeman's playing seem pedestrian, and an otherworldly dimension orchestrated to perfection. Like David Axelrod getting super psychedelic and arranging a record for Ash Ra Tempel. So extravagant yet totally coherent. These sounds are so alive, so full of color, wonder and beauty. It goes without saying that as more folks discover this record it will probably be sampled to death, and we wouldn't be all that surprised if Four Tet, DJ Shadow, or Plaid hadn't already borrowed a bit here and there. Like Jean Claude Vannier's L'Enfant Assassin Des Mouches, this is an early '70s psych-prog masterpiece that is an across the board AQ favorite!
MPEG Stream: "Areknames"
MPEG Stream: "Plancton"
MPEG Stream: "Pollution"

BATTIATO, FRANCO ZA (Artis) cd 16.98
Minimalist avant piano and voice from 1970s Italy. This composer, we've been told, is much beloved by the Chicago Tortoise crowd. We will also soon be restocking his Jukebox which is a lovely, soaring soundtrack to an older Italian TV movie.

BAYLE, F. L'Experience Acoustique, volumes 5-6 2cd 29.00

BAYLE, FRANCOIS Fabulae (FCM) cd 16.98

BAYLE, FRANCOIS Jeita (FCM) cd 16.98

BAYLE, FRANCOIS Vibrations Composees / Grande Ployphonie (MGC) cd 16.98

BEHRMAN, DAVID Leapday Night (Lovely) cd 14.98

BERIO, LUCIANO / BRUNO MADERNA Momenti, Thema - Omaggio A Joyce, Visage / Le Rire, Invenzione Su Una Voce (BV Haast) cd 19.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.

BERNOCCHI, ERALDO & HAROLD BUDD Music For 'Fragments From The Inside' (Sub Rosa) cd 14.98

BERNSTEIN, DAVID W. (EDITOR) San Francisco Tape Music Center: 1960s Counterculture And The Avant-Garde (UC Press) book 26.00
We apologize to tape music buffs near and far, but we shamefully snoozed on reviewing this awesome book about this music movement's seminal Bay Area based hub back in June of this year when it was first published. We thought that now would be a good time (what with the holiday gift-giving season just around the corner as well as the chillier stay-inside-with-a-good-book autumn and winter months) to give it a good ol' shout out! Better late than never, right?
Those already well acquainted will need no further explanation, but for those unfamiliar, in a nutshell, the San Francisco Tape Music Center was a vital cultural and educational meeting ground of adventurous pioneers in audio arts and science. The sonic explorations of composers Morton Subotnick (who performed an in-store presentation here a few years back), Steve Reich, Ramon Sender, Don Buchla, Pauline Oliveros, Terry Riley among others produced some of the most stunning and influential avant-garde sounds of the period in an utterly unassuming locale right here in SF. This creatively tangled web of tape-loop and tape-delay, analog synthesizers and various other electronic tentacles came into fruition back in the early '60s. These days, having been schooled by the wonderful reissued works of numerous seemingly like-minded audio renegade technicians of the BBC Radiophonic Workshop (Daphne Oram, Delia Derbyshire, John Baker to name a few), we still can't help but conjure images of the electronic music artists of that decade donning lab coats with pocket protectors and bespectacled consternated gazes, but this 344-page book reveals just as much the kaleidoscopic opening of minds induced by sound (and in some cases substances). In fact, for those of you who were captivated by the revelatory glimpse of the LA counterculture in the '60s courtesy of the recent Source Family book (The Source: The Untold Story Of Father Yod, Ya Ho Wa And The Source Family), this serves to some degree as a Bay Area counterpart (albeit perhaps somewhat less Hollywood tabloid scandalous). It's the first ever first-person retrospective of the SFTMC. Many a fond memory and occasionally a hair-raising tale were unearthed for this tome. Our current favorites include one involving wild escapades to keep the center afloat on a less than shoestring budget as well as a desperate search across a floor/sea of tape edit detritus to find an errant single note snippet using a dismantled reel-to-reel playback head!
An inspiring, fascinating and often entertaining document of interviews with and essays by all the key figures and more. This 322-page softcover tome is also packed with color and black & white photos, diagrams, drawings, and a comprehensive chronology. But wait, there's still more! A dvd is tucked away in the back which features video documentation from the 2004 Wow & Flutter: The San Francisco Tape Music Center, 1961-Now festival / reunion of sorts that took place in Troy, NY.
Highly recommended!

BERTOIA, HARRY Happy Spirit (Bertoia Studiio) cd 17.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Harry Bertoia's sound sculptures developed from years of work as both a commissioned furniture maker for Knoll and as an environmental sculptor who built large scale balancing kinetic pieces, usually out of bronze. But in the 1970s, Bertoia and his son Val began experimenting with resonant properties of metal itself with huge sculptures of vertical metal shafts that were affixed to a base. They discovered that at those lengths -- some upwards of 20' -- the metal was flexible enough to sustain an extended vibration that continued to resonate within the symphony of tiny strikes with the adjoining metal rods. Thus a slight brush against one of the Bertoia sculptures would trigger a massive swell of metallic drones. Bertoia made an incredible number of recordings in the barn that housed the majority of these sculptures, and produced 11 records from his favorite recordings. "Happy Spirit" features two tracks from the first record "Bellissima / Nova." If possible, it is highly recommended to try experience the Bertoia sculputures themselves. Val Bertoia does maintain the barn where his father kept these sculptures in Bally, Pennsylania... and I (Jim) got to play with one at the Cheekwood Museum in Nashville, Tennessee. But the recordings do make for a pretty good subsitute, and this is only the second Bertoia sculpture-music cd to be released (after one on Japan's PSF label some years ago).
Unfortunately, this reissue concludes with a folk-rock song from a member of the extended Bertoia family... it's really really awful. Why is it there? Val Bertoia should know better. Consider it a non-bonus bonus track and ignore, while enjoying the rest of this lovely disc.
RealAudio clip: "Nova"

BERTOIA, HARRY Unfolding (PSF) cd 16.98

BISCHOFF, JOHN Aperture (23five) cd 14.98
Currently a faculty member in the Center for Contemporary Music at Mills College, John Bischoff has been composing music with computers and electronics since the mid 70s, and has always focused his compositions towards malleable forms that best suit live performances. Within this context, Bischoff seeks to position the construction of sound far beyond the common perception of synthetic music as a mere simulation of the intrinsic sounds of traditional instruments. Instead, Bischoff qualifies his work as the realization of a "reflective intention," where he determines sonic structure not only through the predetermined elements which go into a piece, but also through the active process of listening to the music as it happens and responding accordingly. During the '70s when programming involved crude systems of binary code, Bischoff's vision of the possibilities for computer-based composition fused to performative agency seemed implausible; yet in hindsight, his artistic imperatives were incredibly prescient of contemporary tools such as the nearly omnipotent audio synthesis language Max/MSP, which has been at the core of Bischoff's recent work. An aptly named set of compositions, Aperture opens the possibility for multiple readings through a series of diverse techniques ranging from additive synthesis to FM synthesis to sampled-based processes. Each of the pieces on the album was recorded in real-time with no overdubs. Aperture introduces itself with clusters of samples that sprawl with the deliberate pacing of Morton Feldman's later period, yet Bischoff renders what might be recognizable citations of a piano or percussion as pointillist condensations of digitized pixels and precise plastic details. Over the course of the following pieces, Bischoff unleashes coarse streams of electrons which flange and pulse within the caustic firestorm of divergent timestretching, giving the impression that Bischoff is quite literally tearing the fabric of sound. Bischoff also offers a collaboration with Kenneth Atchley and complements the oversaturated physical noise of Atchley's water fountain sculptures with short digital articulations that ride on the top of Atchley's dense textures.
This is Bischoff's first recording in quite sometime, and has been well worth the wait!
MPEG Stream: "Piano 7hz"
MPEG Stream: "Immaterial States"
MPEG Stream: "Sealed Cantus"

BITTOVA, IVA Cikori (Indies) cd 14.98

BITTOVA, IVA & DOROTHEA KELLEROVA 44 Duets For Two Violins (Rachot Behemot) cd 23.00
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
Gorgeous Bartok violin duets played and sung by the wonderful Iva Bittova and Dorothea Kellerova, two sprightly Czech women who roll their own cigarettes. (And there are enclosed photo cards to prove it, along with a red feather to complement the fancy red velvet packaging.) Minor key, impressionistic, and stark, like the soundtrack to Truffaut film. Looks great, sounds great. Really lovely.
RealAudio clip: "Slovenska"
RealAudio clip: "Preludium"
RealAudio clip: "Rikaldo"

BITTOVA, IVA / ANDREAS KROPER Echoes (Supraphon) cd 18.98

BLOCKS OF CONSCIOUSNESS AND THE UNBROKEN CONTINUUM s/t (Sound 323) book+dvd 90.00
We here at Aquarius Records can be proud that we have an audience who is just as passionate and devoted as we are to a broad spectrum of musics. As much as we would like to, we just can't completely cover every amazing genre, sub-genre, regional dialect, and radical enclave of the world's musical community. We definitely try our best, but just imagine if we did somehow manage, those biweekly email lists would easily triple in size with our fingers spread even further than they already are. While it would be nice to expand our little aesthetic fiefdom, we have to admit that there are plenty of shops around the globe that fill in the gaps. One of those is London's Sound 323, whose niche market emphasizes all things dealing with academic composition, free improv, electro-acoustics, and in particular the pristine aspects of what has been dubbed the "New London Silence." In fact, one of chief protagonists of this London circle of Feldman-esque composers is Sound 323's proprietor Mark Wastell. He along with The Wire's scribe Brian Marley are the editors of a brick of a book published by Sound 323, handsomely designed as an art edition monograph and filled with articles by David Toop, Clive Bell, Brian Marley, Dan Warburton, Andy Hamilton and Will Montgomery as well as texts expounding upon the eroding distinction between improvisation and composition from the likes of Otomo Yoshihide, Bernhard Gunter, Phil Durrant, Steve Roden, Jerome Noetinger, Mattin, and many many other. The book also features a DVD of concert footage from the likes of Keith Rowe, Evan Parker, John Tilbury, Tetuzi Akiyama, Eddie Prevost, John Butcher, and more. Hmm, curious that all of the latest members of AMM make appearances, but no footage from the ensemble that pretty much started the whole push toward the decentered notion of what is composed beforehand and what is created in the moment.
With sound art becoming more and more of a cultural force in the art world (perhaps that should be art with a capital 'A'), Blocks Of Consciousness And The Unbroken Continuum is bound to be one of those historically important documents, detailing one particular cultural phenomenon as it happens by those who are making it happen. At 350+ pages bound in a hefty hardcover book, this is no easy tome to digest; but is well the effort you'll put into it.

BLUM, EBERHARD Berlin To Buffalo (Electronic Music Foundation) cd 14.98
You know a record of nothing but flutes has got to be good!!! Well, actually, I suppose that's not entirely true. I like to think that an all flute recording would be perfect, but the harsh reality is it seldom is. But Eberhard Blum's Berlin To Buffalo is not only an amazing 'flute' record, it is an amazing record, period. Minimal and abstract, dreamy and hypnotic, drone-y, bizarre and quite beautiful. It definitely sounds '20th century classical' but it manages to be more than that. The first track is an extended piece for flute and electronics, but the focus is on the flute, and the piece is beautiful in a very traditional way. Lots of space and ambience and melodies are stretched to their limits. The second track of just electronic sounds (okay so the whole record is not just flutes) is really bizarre. Snippets of mumbling voices, far away tones and sine waves, with the occasional burst of polyphonic dissonance and gentle waves of electronic grit and buzz. Sounds quite contemporary actually. Would be right at home on Ritornell or Alien8 or as the soundtrack to an arthouse horror flick. The epic 41 minute final track for multiple flutes is a gorgeous wash of notes and overtones flodding your senses with sounds, warm and rich and thick and shimmering. Quite reminiscent of Phil Niblock, albeit a tad more melodic. One of Andee's favorite records of the year!
RealAudio clip: "Proportion 1"
RealAudio clip: "Saturday Afternoon 5 O'Clock"

BODE, PETER / ANDREW DEUTSCH / PAULINE OLIVEROS Carrier (Neat) cd 14.98

BOLLANI, STEFANO Piano Solo (ECM) cd 22.00
Bbbb-oo-rrr-ing.

BRANCA, GLENN Indeterminate Activity Of Resultant Masses (Atavistic) cd 14.98
It's no secret we are huge Glenn Branca fans here at AQ. No one has found ways to create such dissonant beauty and mesmerizing power with guitars quite like Mr. Branca. The title piece here, performed in 1981 with 10 guitars and drums and timpani is one of the most impressive Branca pieces we have ever heard. Its inescapable tension wraps itself around your ears and while you feel it's grasp taking a hold of you, you don't really ever want it to end. With young devotees like Lee Ranaldo and Thurston Moore in the ensemble it's no wonder the piece sounds so perfect and received the long standing ovation it so deserved. But one man in attendance of this performance was not impressed. In fact he had lots to say about it, and nothing positive. That wouldn't be that big of a deal of course if that person wasn't John Cage!! In a clever twist of their long running rivalry and Cage's very public dismissal of Branca's work, Branca decided to follow the title piece on this reissue with a conversation that John Cage had with Wim Mertons about Branca's piece. In the conversation Cage speaks very eloquently as he always did, about his dislike for Branca's piece and his work in general. He goes as far to call the piece fascist, which then led to a very public and bitter tiff between two legends of forward thinking 20th century music. We have to admit that sometimes we actually like hearing Cage talk even more then we like listening to his music. As the rhythm of his voice and the depth of his intelligence is so damn pleasing to take in. While we wish Wim Mertons would have done a better job of defending Branca, we can't blame him for being a bit tongue tied and slow in the face of Cage's eloquent understated fury. We can imagine that if we ever had the opportunity to have a serious exchange of views about music with Cage we probably would have been crazy nervous and marble mouthed. The record ends with a late 80's piece by Branca called Harmonic Series Chords which is a really nice somber piece performed by the New York Chamber Sinfonia. Like two heavyweight champions exchanging blows we feel lucky to get to sit on the sidelines as Cage disses Branca, and Branca's music speaks so loudly for itself. Highly recommended!
MPEG Stream: "Indeterminate Activity Of Resultant Masses"
MPEG Stream: "So That Each Person Is In Charge Of Himself (john cage)"
MPEG Stream: "Harmonic Series Chords"

BRANCA, GLENN Lessons (Acute) cd 14.98
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BRANCA, GLENN Symphony Nos. 8 & 10 - Live At The Kitchen (Atavistic) dvd 21.00
There's been quite a little resurgence of interest in the eighties downtown NY scene, specifically the guitar orchestras and proto-post rock of Rhys Chatham and Glenn Branca. This DVD features two live performances recorded in 1995 with an unknown (at least to us) ensemble with Branca at the helm conducting. The music is fantastic, dark and propulsive. Repetitive and trance-like, with churning guitars and tribal drums. Sound remarkably similar to AQ favorites Circle or Salvatore. Visually, there's not a whole lot to see, although it is cool to hear what sounds like your basic rock band, but is in fact a large ensemble, with guitar players struggling to 'rock out' but stuck behind their music stands. The visuals do reflect the music quite nicely though, dark and brooding, with spare lighting and lots of empty space on the screen.

BRANCA, GLENN The Ascension (Acute) cd 14.98
THIS IS CURRENTLY OUT OF PRINT OR OTHERWISE UNAVAILABLE TO US AT THE MOMENT, SO PLEASE DO NOT ORDER IT. SORRY.
I only ever knew Glenn Branca as "the guitar orchestra guy" responsible for assembling huge groups of guitarists (often well known rock guitarists), to perform huge, throbbing, hypnotic and repetitive compositions -- some for ten guitarists, fifty guitarists, even one hundred guitarists. The recent Rhys Chatham box, reviewed a few lists back, suggested that perhaps Branca's guitar orchestra concept was 'borrowed' from Chatham, as Branca had performed in many of Chatham's multiple guitar ensembles. But in much the same way that we were surprised by the rock-ness of the early Chatham material, this early recording from Branca and his four guitar/bass/drums outfit has much more in common with noisy post punk/post rock: Bastro, Bitch Magnet, Slint and the like, than Ligeti, Penderecki, Messiaen or any of the other names dropped in Lee Ranaldo's liner notes. Extended drony, atonal rhythmic explorations stretch on and on, building horror-movie-minor-key tension, building and building and building, before bursting into unrelenting rock rhythm/riffs. Lots of the more rock parts sound like an instrumental version of North Western punk rockers The Wipers, but with lots of odd dynamics ala Bastro or Slint and with the extended riff repetition of modern minimalism stretching the songs into droning, hypnotic master works. Throbbing and relentless, pounding and intricate, weaving back and forth between ferocious, unrelenting rock-action, and epic, complex geometric stop/start, hypno-minimalism.
MPEG Stream: "The Spectacular Commodity"
MPEG Stream: "Lesson No. 2"

BRUHIN, ANTON Orax / Rotomotor (Alga Marghen) cd 16.98
An archival release of '70s cassette-tape works by this odd Swiss sound artist, consisting of environmental sounds, ping-pong recording techniques, and other spatial / audio experimentation. Byram thinks most of this is the sound of good European arts funding gone to waste, except for the last piece, which is an absolute mindnumbing half-hour palindromic recitation of German words arranged by their similarity in sound. Makes the disc worth owning for this track alone. Allan agrees that "Rotomotor" is the best track, but he finds the rest of this at least intriguing, especially through earphones.
On a side note: If you come into AQ fairly frequently you may have observed this customer we have that is always knocking shit off the counter. We want to say something to him but we're too embarrassed to confront his hamfistedness, so we're passive-aggressively mentioning it here, for 6000 people to enjoy. Well, said customer has acquired a young apprentice now, and one night the two of them came in together to polish up their anti-social skills. Anyway, the younger fella comes up to the counter to ask about this cd, if we have two of them -- cuz of course these guys must be peas in a pod -- so they can both get one. Well, turns out that the nicely sealed copies we showed 'em both had ever so slight dimples on the upper right hand corner (like a light impression made by a pointed object, so slight as to be practically invisible). Because of this, annoying apprentice desired the display copy instead. But if YOU can deal with the "invisible dimple", we've still got a couple copies.
RealAudio clip: "Orax"
RealAudio clip: "Rotomotor"

CAGE, JOHN Atlas Eclipticalis / Winter Music / 103 (Asphodel) 4cd 30.00
Asphodel presents three pieces of Cage's symphonic work fortunately without DJ Spooky to add insipid post-modern liner notes or to 'digitally record' the performances. "Atlas Eclipticalis" and "Winter Music" are severely spartan orchestrations for Cage with a huge spaces set between each of the tones, set indeterminately by Cage as he traced constellations onto music paper. Here, the Orchestra of the S.E.M. Ensemble with David Tudor, perform these two scores simultaneously. The liner notes indicate that these two pieces were meant to complement each other, but it seems a little vague in terms of the rationale behind the fusing of the two. Regardless, this performance is quite spectacular.
"103" was composed more as a collection of 103 solos in which each instrument plays a series of single tones with specified windows of time for the tones to be played. Cage had intended for this piece to be performed without a conductor. Instead, the length of each of the 103 solos would determined by a digital clock. However, the performance presented here by the Janacek Philharmonic Orchestra from the Czech Republic was conducted by Petr Kotik. While Cage not surpringly didn't care much for the idea of rehearsing, Kotik believes that the conceptual agenda may be augmented to maintain the integrity of a performance.