Άβατον - Άβατον (Avaton - Avaton)

 

Legendary - now broken-up - Greek band (proteges of Manos Chatzidakis, one of the three most prominent Greek composers of 20th century) from the early 90s playing a mix of new-agey/ambient folk with purported influences from ancient Greek music (though, as we know, there are no actual musical indications of what ancient Greek music sounded like) and lyrics derived from the poetry of Sappho, the 6th-century-BCE godmother of lesbianism. The final two tracks, "I Siragga," and "Simoun," are among my all-time favorite tracks ever since I was a teenager and I discovered this album and I play "I Siragga" very frequently in my car. 1991 LP on Sirius (Manos Chatzidakis's label)

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Asunta – Astralis

And again. And again. And again. And again.

1999 cdr on Nefryt.

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Asunta – Transfiguracja

 

Yes, more of the same repetitive clarinet melodies, and yes it's equally mesmerizing.

1999 cdr on Hey Joe.

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Asunta – Landscapes

Don't remember how I ran into this band, but due to the Russian invasion in Ukraine, it was quite hard to manage to pay a Russian guy who sold it to me, as all common platforms have banned transactions with people from Russia.

This is one of the most mesmerizing, bewitching, meditative musics ever recorded. It is just clarinet-led psychedelic ambient drone essentially playing the same thing over and over but it's so beautiful I would include in the soundtrack of the movie Tangerines.

Originally released as a tape by Nefryt in 1996, my rip is from the 2001 cdr reissue on Lollipop Shop.

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A.G. – Polygon:08

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

An earlier recording to 2020's excellent Lonea (check here), again piano-based but with a slightly more frequently use of electronics. Sparse, forlorn, ambient elegies. 2010 self-released cdr.

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Sacher-Pelz - Tavola Anatomica XIII

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Quite subterranean and hypnotic two-track ambient by Maurizio Bianchi's alter-ego. 2019 cdr on Tavole Anatomiche.

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Waz Hoola – Epithelials 3" cdr

 

 

 

 

 

 

Yep, last Waz Hoola release that evaded now in my hands. Deep sinister droning ambient, one of his best recordings hands down. 3" cdr on MUZZeDIA VERHEAD.

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Helena Ford appreciation

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Helena Ford is a Chicago-based transgender musician whose work expands all over drone, improv, dungeon synth, dark ambient, industrial noise, electroacoustic, and microtonal deep listening ambient. Much of the themes on which she has based her music revolves around gender dysphoria, hormone replacement and psychotherapy. Really, her recordings are so multifaceted you should just devote two or three days listening to the whole shit, which is also free on her bandcamp here, but I'm just going to pick a few which really impressed the shit out of me. Also loving the corpsepaint and the Burzum-like skullcrasher bat thingy, guess Varg would be really pissed at! Links on titles. Goes without saying that this blog upholds difference and the challenge of gender/sex stereotypes along with fighting fascism, racism, capitalism, patriarchy and homophobia and is open to any non-binary/LGBTQI+-themed music that will be appealing to me.

Therapy Goals: revolving around psych/Eastern scale guitar meanderings and full-on Sunn O))) like power drone.

The Human Veil - s/t: holy fucking shit dungeon synth and organ vespers-like goodness

Examinations in Minimalism & Transgender Musicality: weird alternation between sine waves, modular drone, mellotrons and deep listening ambient

Larsen Symphonique + Organ Works: microtonal drone, organ holiness and avant-garde drone.

Elegy for 1992: bro this is soooo good. She's taken figures from John Cage's prepared piano Sonatas and added huge reverb to it.

Pieces for Electric Bass, Baritone, and Guitar: can't say how much I'm loving this, especially the second baritone track. Get it. Now. It's free.

Hemicrania: ambient noise wall discordant bliss.

Music for Bows and Rosin: this sounds quite a bit like post-reformation Skullflower, especially around the period Lee Stokoe was in. Great.

A.G. - Lonea

 

Hello after such a long time. Things were bad, busy, hectic, lots of changes. Things are still not good, though slightly quieter. Thanks to everyone that asked about me and wrote in general. I know it was not polite not to answer but I really didn't want to get into the idea of having to write again on the blog. But yeah, there's lots of stuff I'd still like to share.

So A.G. is a Greek musician and visual artist. His music is based on piano and sounds and is very solitary, melancholic and deep. I love this album and A.G.'s music in general. I'll post some more stuff.

2020 2 X Lp on Arbouse Recordings.

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VYRYV x Morbid Debasement - Split

VYRYV is Lee Stokoe (Culver, etc, regular readers you know my worship) playing Posh Isolation-style synth ambient; Morbid Debasement plays more dark-ambient-ish with organ. Cool stuff. 2019 2X3" cdr.

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Shady Glyphs - Meditations On Caligari's Shadow

 

Amazing devotional fourth-world pagan ambient ritual similar to Vibracathedral Orchestra and Million Brazilians by this unknown Yorkshire project (though I suspect an Ashtray Navigations connection...). 2019 cd on Memoirs Of An Aesthete.

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Million Brazilians – Poderoso Monicato

At this point, MB had already started shifting into the sprawling psych/free jazz/ambient fourth world primitive cannibal spaceship that they now are, and this one is really a recording you can get lost in. 2015 LP on Psychic Sounds.

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Xqui - Ambients

 

One of my favorite musicians of recent years returns with yet another immersive recording. This is one feels slightly less close to his pure Lovecraftian evil approach in Capitulate, November or Lleisiau and more as a return to his more levitational early releases (the first four EPs and Dragon) with a heavy ambient wash sound, hints at orchestral music, William Basinski, Giulio Aldinucci, and Stars of the Lid, but always with his deeply personal touch. No link this time, this deserves your support, so over to his bandcamp and get it. 2020 cd on Wormhole World.

Million Brazilians - Strange Oasis

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is their most recent release and it's extremely cavernous, minimalist, and ritualistic, as well as much quieter and more esoteric. Which is a great thing when you take a listen to it. Some of the parts would actually be envied by the Wolf Eyes of Undertow. 2019 cd on Nonlocal Research.

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Million Brazilians - Slip Enchantments

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Starts deceptively thinking you're into their most rock records, but the two tracks in the middle are some of their jazziest to date, only to end up in an epic heavy ambient jazz ritual jam straight from the Amon Duul cauldron. 2016 tape on Lost Discoveries Exotic Music Shop.

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Johann Wlight - rayth

 

Early Johann Wlight release, which, as with most of his releases, typically goes between the hesychastic/sacred and the abrasive/ominous. 2001 cdr on Sunny Days Out.

https://mega.nz/file/qcVXyAyQ#UoxKdpmgCEdiCPZPMSfYTvKkhYADfaYmdsLm8yqgTHI

Eric Lunde - Suites For Solo Analog Cassette Recorder

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Every night I have trouble sleeping due to stress and lots of obligations and this is the only thing that helps me drift into sleep. It's the sound of mechanical nothingness, as the guy just put recorded the sound of deck players recording themselves in their built-in mics. 2002 self-released 2 x cdr.

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Mummy Dust Trippers ‎– Song Of The Cactus House

By request of a reader, here's yet another release from the Million Brazilians universe by two of their members with a deeper emphasis on their ambient and new age side. I wouldn't place it too far from Robert Rich's mid-late 1990s material or O Yuki Conjugate, or even SPK's Zamia Lehmanni, and there also seems to be an affinity with Razen. 2018 LP on Lost Discoveries Exotic Music Shop.

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Nurse With Wound ‎– Shipwreck Radio

The ice-cold sounds made by Nurse With Wound during their residency at a radio in the Arctic Lofoten Islands. Included are the Final Broadcasts and Gulls Just Wanns Have Fun bonus cds.

Shipwreck Radio Volume One (Seven Sonic Structures From Utvaer)
Volume Two (Eight Enigmatic Episodes From Utvær)
Shipwreck Radio - Final Broadcasts
Gulls Just Wanna Have Fun

The Gerogerigegege - >(decrescendo)

New great LP by Juntaro, continuing his wild experimentations. This one has been influenced by a 1930s children's novel called Gauche The Cellist written by - overlooked during his lifetime - author Kenji Miyazawa. It has been adapted into an anime film by the unsurpassable Isao Takahata, and I haven't seen but now I must. The overall concept is that there is a mediocre cellist struggling to be accepted into his town's orchestra and he gets to improve with the aid of animals that speak to him and instruct him how to play. Juntaro recorded it using as his only instrument the hapi drum (a melodic percussive instrument which I was collecting money to buy years ago but I never did) and other outside sounds like cicadas, frogs, birds. The sounds are actually very soothing, with the hapi being barely heard at times, and the nature sounds being calming and entrancing. Certainly nothing we would expect from Juntaro, but highly recommended.

2019 tape release on Cav Empt, this is the 2020 LP rerelease by The Trilogy Tapes.

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