Notice Recordings Announce New Releases from Jamie Drouin & Lance Austin Olsen, Nick Hoffman

Notice Recordings are planning to release their second cassette batch of the year very soon. It features two new releases, the first of which is a recording from Jamie Drouin and Lance Austin Olsen. It's entitled Hidden Paradise and finds the two continuing to make subtle but cavernous ambient soundscapes. Earlier this year, the two released The Source on their own record label, Infrequency Editions.

The second release comes from Nick Hoffman. The album is entitled Salamander and finds the musician crafting electronic-based sound design that skitters but feels meditative all the same. Earlier this year, Hoffman released Parvae Harmoniae on his own Pilgrim Talk label. These albums mark the first time any of these artists have appeared on the label. You can listen to excerpts from both albums above via SoundCloud. Be on the look out for both releases on the Notice Recordings Bandcamp page soon.

Merzbow Releases New Album on "Compact Vinyl"

Legendary noise musician Merzbow has released a new album via Dirtier Promotions entitled Hyakki Echo. Merzbow has been releasing some of his albums through the label since the 90s, including Wildwood II from earlier this year. Hyakki Echo is getting released on what the label calls "compact vinyl", a hybrid vinyl/CD. The vinyl side features a three minute piece while the CD side features four tracks that span 53 minutes. As a note, listeners are warned not to play the CD on a traditional "slot-in" CD player. You can order the album from the label (UK), Forced Exposure (US), or at Boomkat (UK). You can also hear samples of the album at the Boomkat page.

Hyakki Echo tracklist:

A. Amadare Guitar
B1. Hyakki Echo Part 1
B2. Hyakki Echo Part 2
B3. Hyakki Echo Part 3
B4. Hyakki Echo Part 4

Holotype Editions Announce New Ghédalia Tazartès and Maya Dunietz Album

Holotype Editions has announced a new album. It features a live recording of a performance between Ghédalia Tazartès and Maya Dunietz at Cafe OTO in 2013. It's called Schulevy Maker and you can listen to excerpts from the album above. It comes out on September 23rd and is limited to 300 copies on black vinyl. You can find more information about the album and pre-order it from the Holotype Editions website here.

Schulevy Maker tracklist:

1. Part 1 (22:57)
2. Part 2 (22:52)

Winds Measure Recordings Announces Three New Albums

Anne Guthrie and Seymour Wright - Chelsea Bridge

Ulrich Krieger - The Yggdrasil-Soli

Ben Owen - fo (f

Winds Measure Recordings has just announced three new releases that are available for pre-order. The first is Ulrich Krieger's The Yggdrasil-Soli. It's a project conceived and curated by Krieger that spans five discs and features solo compositions and performances from numerous artists including Antoine Beuger, Radu Malfatti, Michael Pisaro, Mark So, and Julia Holter. It's limited to 200 copies and you can find more information about the release here.

The second album is a collaboration between Anne Guthrie and Seymour Wright entitled Chelsea Bridge. Guthrie plays the french horn while Wright plays the alto sax. They also provide field recordings from NYC and London, respectively. The album is limited to 300 copies and you can find more information about the album here.

The third new release comes from Ben Owen and is entitled fo (f. It features two tracks that total an hour in length. It's limited to 200 copies and you can find more information about the album here.

You can hear soundclips from each release above. All three releases can be pre-ordered from the Winds Measure Recordings store here. The label currently has a bundle for all three releases that you can order for $56 here. All three albums are expected to be released next month.

Erstwhile Records Announce New Five Disc Jürg Frey Album

Erstwhile Records has just announced a new album for its ErstClass imprint. It's by Jürg Frey and entitled l'àme est sans retenue I. According to Google Translate, it means "the soul is unrestrained". The album is composed of a single piece that lasts approximately six hours and spans five discs. It's the longest piece Frey has written in his 40+ years of composing and is also the longest piece on any Erstwhile imprint. It's also the first archival release for the record label. Erstwhile owner Jon Abbey states that the album will hopefully be released in October.

Earlier this year, Frey released Ephemeral Constructions on Edition Wandelweiser Records.

It was previously stated that the above picture was the album cover; it is merely a promotional image.

Graham Lambkin and Áine O'Dwyer Announce New Collaborative Album

Erstwhile Records has just announced that a new collaborative album between Graham Lambkin and Áine O'Dwyer is to come in 2018. This marks the first time O'Dwyer will be featured on the label. Erstwhile had the following text accompanying the announcement:

Áine O’Dwyer and Graham Lambkin are multi-disciplinary artists whose work explores the nexus between music, text, illustration, theater, and the dissolution of the audience/performer divide. Both individually and in collaboration they have explored the latent potential of acoustical space, transforming both fantastical and mundane environments into aesthetic centrums of possibility.

O'Dwyer and Lambkin began their collaborative endeavors in December 2016 with a performance at the First Unitarian Congregational Society in Brooklyn, NY, and have since gone on to present their work in London at Cafe OTO and the Horse Hospital, and most recently on the Greek island of Syros where they were the invited artists in residence for the 10 day Sound Paths workshop. 

The pair will be visiting Ireland this September to undertake the creation of a topographical 'sound map' connecting real and imagined Irish heritages through a series of localized site-specific performances that mark O'Dwyer's first homeland concerts in over a year, and Lambkin's debut in the country. The resultant work will see publication in 2018 through the esteemed Erstwhile label.

Graham Lambkin released an album with Taku Unami entitled The Whistler earlier this year. Lambkin is also slated to have a release with Michael Pisaro and another with Jürg Frey for Erstwhile Records. Áine O'Dwyer recently released Beast Diaries via her Bandcamp page.

Impulsive Habitat Releases New Album from Una Lee

Impulsive Habitat has released a new album from Una Lee. It's entitled in Transit: [& transitions] and is available for free download from the label's site here. This marks Lee's second release for the label; her previous album being Dah eum back in 2013. Lee said the following of the album:

When before and/or during traveling for work, not always feeling exactly excited, taking sound recordings or better described as listening to the environment through a sound recording device in a concentrated form is helpful to me in calming myself down and making me feel safe. This 31 minute long composition consists of 12 sound recordings taken over the course of 5 days in 3 countries, 6 cities and 3 houses between 2 homes of mine via 1 international airspace.
The recordings are primarily simply juxtaposed after one another, somewhat depicting the last intercontinental journey that I’ve made, which was long and subsequently made me restless.

The first third of the piece is rather contemplative and relaxed, in which I listen to the natural environment that surrounds one of the homes of mine. The later two thirds of the piece is busier, louder, more crowded, aurally describing the constantly changing, uneasy environment by comparison that one goes through when traveling far and/or for a long time. I close the piece with the sound recording of my environment when having arrived in my other home, which also concludes the journey itself.

The piece is not only about being on the road; en route; in transit: it is also about the transitions that tag alongside being in transit. Some transitions happen more sensibly, some others rather noticeably, and some at times rather unpleasantly. I intended that the transitions between the sound recordings within the piece do speak for themselves as well as on my behalf.

Caduc Releases Gabi Losoncy's Nobody's Pushing You

Gabi Losoncy's newest album has just been released by caduc. It's entitled Nobody's Pushing You and you can hear an excerpt from it above. Last year, she released Judgment on the same label. Earlier this year, Losoncy released Security Besides Love via Recital. Nobody's Pushing You is limited to 100 copies and comes with a 12 page color booklet featuring Losoncy's own writing, photography, and art. You can order the album on the caduc. site here.

Black Truffle Releases New Annea Lockwood LP Featuring Two Unreleased Works

Oren Ambarchi's Black Truffle label has released a new Annea Lockwood LP. It features "Tiger Balm", a composition that Lockwood wrote while living in the UK that was meant to explore "the possibility of evoking ancient communal memories through sound." Listen to the track below. The album is also backed by two unreleased works on the B side—"Amazonia Dreaming" and "Immersion". The former was composed in 1987 and is performed by Dominic Donato. On the track, Donato utilizes his voice and a snare drum to "evoke the nocturnal soundscape of the Amazon rainforest". "Immersion" was composed in 1998 and is performed by Frank Cassara. It's a more meditative piece for marimba, two tam-tams, and a gong. According to Lockwood, it "grew out of a fascination with the rich beating frequencies generated by long cluster rolls in the low register of the marimba and the interaction between the marimba and a quartz bowl gong tuned to F." You can purchase the LP now from Forced Exposure (US), Boomkat (UK), Bleep (UK), Kompakt (Germany), and A-Musik (Germany). The LP also comes with a score for "Amazonia Dreaming".

Editions Mego Releases New Album from Yasunao Tone

The incredibly undersung Fluxus and Group Ongaku member Yasunao Tone has just released a new album via Editions Mego. It's entitled AI Deviation #1, #2 and features live performances that took place at ISSUE Project Room on June 9th, 2016. Russell Haswell handled the album's mixing and mastering. You can purchase the CD from the Editions Mego site here. The two tracks span a total of 74 minutes and can be streamed in their entirety below courtesy of the label. 

Tone had the following to say regarding the performances:

I have had an idea if I apply the neural network to create my sound work for long time. When I had a performance at Centre Pompidou with Peter Rehberg and other friends I tried to talk about the idea with a French guy from IRCAM. But, he couldn’t understand my idea, which by using neural network the sound I create would never have any repetitions. 

That was 2002 and I had to wait until 2015 when I had a grant from New York State Council on the Arts through ISSUE Project Room, then its director Lawrence Kumpf applied for my new work. The grant finally made possible for making my cherished idea, the neural network piece, reality.

I had talked about the idea with Prof. Tony Myatt at Surrey University, UK and he developed the software for the piece with a team included Dr. Paul Modler. At the lab in the University a series of my performances of my MP3 Deviation were captured and used to train Kohonen Neural Networks to develop artificial intelligences that simulate my performances. Hence a birth of new piece AI Deviations.

I had a premiere at Issue Project Room on June 9th 2016 and the venue was more than packed and here is the performance of the piece.