#self-release

Mach-Hommy drops more stuff on digital platforms now, but he had a long stretch where he only released small-run physicals directly to his consumers. No big rollouts, no blogs, no IG Live scandals. Straight, luxurious heat straight from the source (and priced like it, too).

Those two give hope that the work can speak for itself. It seems like people are getting more and more tired of the algorithm these days. All the social media stuff turned out to be fake. One-to-one connections and making people feel something is what's real.

The Straddlerz – The Straddlerz

The Straddlerz“The Straddlerz”Dirty rock’n’rollSelf-releasedOn 29th January 2021 When two strains of Latin blood – Italian and Argentinian – come together to produce rock music, the outcome must be passionate. And that’s what The Straddlerz self-titled debut album is. The recording is way too raw, so I’m guessing the producer wanted to preserve the original intensity of both Linda Filippin’s…

Polar Visions Amplitude Listening Set 1 - Daniel Menche exploration - Reviewing:

Daniel Menche - Soundtrack for the book "D'entre les morts"

Self-released on November 12, 2018 by Daniel Menche 
Reviewed format: 16-bit/44.1kHz ALAC download of the EP

Connected listening: further self-released works and reissues by Daniel Menche on his Bandcamp page (https://danielmenche.bandcamp.com/music)

The second release in this first Listening Set (which is now fully themed around exploring releases by Daniel Menche) on Polar Visions Amplitude is Soundtrack for the book "D'entre les morts”, a digital reissue of a soundtrack that Menche made for the novel D'entre les morts by Guillaume Belhomme and which was originally released with this same soundtrack included with the book published by Éditions Lenka Lente. The French publisher / label has released numerous other novels with accompanying soundtracks by Nurse With Wound, Vomir, Andrew Liles, My Cat Is An Alien and others as well as several books on Jazz and Avant-Garde music, at times in bilingual editions. As Menche mentions in the description of the download of this release the story of D'entre les morts is about a man on a train who’s eating glass. Menche’s approach to soundtrack such a strange story was indeed to use various sounds of crunched glass and trains but the result is even more eerie than you could guess from the description itself. This piece is more cyclic in nature than Desiccation but equally strong and immersive in nature as you will find out soon. In the case of this reissue you’ll find the music in the form of a single CD quality track, identical to the physical mini-CD but with cover artwork by Menche, a dark grayscale photo (in line with the other releases on Menche’s Bandcamp page) of what looks like a tree-trunk but also eeriely seems to resemble a skull of some wild animal, intriguing imagery. Let’s dive into this soundtrack now.

Soundtrack for the book "D'entre les morts” carries some similarities in sonic approach to Desiccation, even though the source materials used are much more of a mixture of acoustic and electronic elements with the piece being built using quite clearly defined layers, some of which hover around the stereo field. These layers can be separated into metallic, screechy and squelchy electronic. The metallic layers form the main drones that carry the piece forward, a mixture of glowing resonant struck iron, hammered metal bars (sounding somewhere between a coat hanger and the kind of triangle “bell” you sometimes see in prisons in films announcing food breaks) as well as further overtones that are audible especially in the first half of the piece. The screechy sounds in the piece are all the layered train recordings of which especially the train brakes give them a note of harshness but besides the brake sounds you can also hear some clattering, wooden like sonic details from the trains. Menche hasn’t utilised the train sounds in a very explicit manner in this piece, feeling more like an accompaniment to the metal works than a steady clattering rhythm that is a bit obvious as others might have used them which does elevate these sounds above connecting them too much to their own source. The squelchy electronic sounds add a bit of Noise to the mixture, mostly aesthetically pleasing but in the second half growing in intention, the stream of the water like liquid scratchy texture appears to imagine the novel character’s disturbed brain in quite a literal but on-point manner. As I mentioned in the introduction, this soundtrack features a more cyclic kind of composition in which the separate layers are active in various phases, some short, some longer. The hammered iron droning appears for the majority of the piece and changes ever so slightly in pitch though the tones themselves mostly stay the same and is working together with the iron resonances in the first half of the piece, in the second half these hammered tones become much more prominent however, also becoming a bit more minimalistic and repetitive in nature. This does make the second half feel a bit more focussed on the “deep” of the deep listening method of experiencing this piece as the effect of these tones creeps into the mind mostly as a kind of hypnosis with some of the other sounds falling a bit out of focus (in my experience at least) but it does allow the squelchy electronics to subtly grow more intense in this second half to eventually overtake the main focus of the piece in the ending fade-out of the piece, a crackling soup of crunchy noise softly seeping away into the distance. Looking into the general immersive effect that this soundtrack has on the mind I felt that besides the actual story from the novel the piece especially relates to a kind of hyper-sensitivity of sounds. The imagery conjured up in my mind was especially that of a man locked up in the living room of his house, scared of all the sounds around him, whether its a chiming old clock or even a bit of creaking in the walls, all sounds appear to be piercing into his ears and mind likes knives stabbing him. The subtle minor / major key shifts of the resonant drones of this piece also further hint at an unstable state of mind with the piece never quite falling into a musical kind of “tones” or chords but remaining in that signature Menche field of eerie abstract tones. The aforementioned cyclic nature of this piece also makes the piece feel quite more like a summary of events, layered over each other rather than the traditional progressive form of a soundtrack / soundtrack composition but the variations that do appear over time still do keep the piece flowing forward too even though dramatic events never happen within the piece. Soundtrack for the book "D'entre les morts” is another great entry in Daniel Menche’s extensive discography and features some crisp mastering by experimental musician Andrew Liles who creates very interesting and imaginative solo music as well as part of several avant-garde groups the most well-known of which Nurse With Wound. Liles especially brought out some great warmth in the mid and high frequencies of the spectrum and brought out both the sharpness of the metals and the clarity of clattering and squelchy sonic elements in the mix. I award this soundtrack a Polar Visions Amplitude of 95 dB. This is another highly recommended listen within Menche’s discography and once again showcases Menche's imaginative, enjoyable and deeply felt creativity in the field of abstract Drone inspired Industrial music.

Resonant Visions 1

공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief): 무너지기 (Crumbling) (2018)

Album Cover by 신혜정

Reviewed format: Self-released Digital Album by 공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief)

Welcome to the first in a new series of reviews on this blog focused on connecting graphic design, illustration, photography of music releases with the music contained within as well as reviewing both the artwork and music I select based on my personal taste. With this series I aim to showcase both quality release artwork as well as its effect on the perception of the music. Today I have for you this album by South Korean artist 공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief) titled 무너지기 (Crumbling), this album was Self-released by 공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief) in 2018. The download of this album features the Album Cover in good resolution as well as the 8 album tracks in 16-bit/44.1kHz CD quality audio, with total timing of 45 minutes. The Album Cover you can see above is by 신혜정 , I couldn't find any info on the artist online unfotunately with the name being very common in South Korea. The artwork has a very vintage kind of look to it, a grainy analogue photograph of a man fishing near the sea on a dark brown beach and with subdued blue sky conjurs up ideas of a retro sounding album of simple down to earth music. However the artist name and album title in multi-coloured silhouette like Korean characters in which the artist name is bended adds the element of Psychedelia to the vibe of the artwork, hinting at something subtly trippy inside. A really nicely minimal artwork design that puts the focus on the photograph but adds that spacey twist to the design with the character design. And indeed the album sounds quite like I imagined from looking closely to this cover, the music is K-folk with plenty of psychedelic elements in it, subdued vocals and a down to earth yet playful ambience to all the songs. Yet it's more experimental than I thought it'd be, so the character design's multi-colours do give away that there's in fact a lot of electronics and creative (lo-fi) effect experiments in the production of the songs and it's much trippier than I expected. So the album cover gives a good idea of the music but be ready to expect something quite different too.

Now onto the review of the actual songs on 무너지기 (Crumbling). The album's 8 tracks are mostly longer than an average folk song featuring expansive compositions in terms of vocal melodies and instrumental arrangements of the songs that often feature these curious and interesting psychedelic twists in their chord progressions as well as the aforementioned usage of synths, synth bass and sometimes electronic beats. This music has a very cinematic feel to it as well, with the story-telling through melodies and vocals (although I don't understand Korean unfortunately) combined with the many experimental details in the production as well as usage of a lot of shifting in the depth of the space the music is performed in, adding interesting acoustic effects to the music that put you as the listener inside the house (?) or room the music is performed in. First song 왜? (Why?) starts with some cool electronic filtered experimentation and then moves to the main part of the song. The male singer and female singer both sing in this warm tone over bright acoustic guitar. Apart from the musical content I especially like the lo-fi recording hiss and slightly fuzzy saturated sound the music on this album has, it gives it a great warm vintage sound (like the analogue photo on the cover) that still feels contemporary and authentic too however. On 왜? (Why?) the music moves from acoustic subtle parts to more intense synth layered fiery parts in which the vocals get accompanied by arpeggiated sharp high pitched synths and punchy compressed drums dancing around the room. A filter is also used to add interesting buildups in this piece created an ambience that subtly moves from bright to more subdued back again and the tuning of the synths is also different in the second half from the first which creates exciting new harmonies. The song feels pretty abstract in its melodies and rhythms too actually, this is catchy music but it's also more complex than your average folk song but if you keep vibing with this it definitely works. Then on 쇠사슬 (Ahhhh, These Chains!) we have a more acoustic oriented song which also features glockenspiel. The song moves in a waltz like tempo and features plenty of tinkling guitars through the stereo field, intense compressed drums punching through the mix pretty nicely as well as various synth elements creating a dense trippy atmosphere that is maybe a bit too maximalist to some people but I like this kind of excess, this is great. There's several great soloing on the acoustic guitar as well and a great instrumental outro part, really wild and fun Psychedelic Folk music. 감은 듯 (Gameun Deut) is a more conventional sounding K-folk song but it's definitely really fun with the dense sounding production almost drowning out the subtle male and female vocals but it works and the song feels full of joyful vibrant positive energy, the psychedelic harmonic twists and easy going Asian pop vocal melody styles feeling very pleasant and tasteful. The song also features a subdued musical / soundtrack like bridge part which sounds pretty old-school like from an old Korean drama film, very good. 곡선과 투과광 (Curve and Light) has a very cool funky sound to it with grooving drums, grinding (strings) bass and vibrant warm synths that also still sounds very Korean but with that pleasant hazy lo-fi filter over it and a quirky playful middle part which features only vocals and weird quirky synths as well as these cool mechanic clangs adding an unexpected Industrial element to the mix. This subtly moves to an intense second half with a half-step groove, flashing funky synths and jumpy electronic drums also featuring that nice Industrial clanging percussion. What is great about the vocals combined with the sometimes more fiery parts is that the male and female singer never really exaggerate their vocals but stay pretty calm singing them which adds a nice warm element of peace to the music, very nice. 함께 무너지기 (Crumbling Together) is the album's longest song at almost 10 minutes and it's exactly the right length. The songs moves into various directions melodically and arangement (and production) wise, the crumbling theme is put into music here through tinkling instruments, and the "broken" sound of the recording of the male vocals about two minutes into the song. This quite like a progressive Folk kind of song, subtly shifting progressing from ambience to more fully-fledged "crumbling" parts of tinkling and "falling" instrument clouds. Highlights in this song include the Middle Eastern strings at the start of the second half of the song as well as the sea field recordings added to the acoustic guitar and bell like instrument at the end, this sound directly feels like what the album cover looks like. 함께 무너지기 (Crumbling Together) feels like a great sweet subtle kind of story told through music moving into mysterious but also vibrant and rich directions but it all comes down to magical experiences in a calm place near the sea, peaceful living, that's what it feels like. 수호자 (Protector) is brighter and more explosive again, in a waltz like tempo the song features positive and "calmly excited" melodies and soothing vocals that then burst into explosive climaxes full of glistening synths, intense drums and bass as well as pleasant acoustic guitar as well. There are those sweet Middle Eastern strings here as well, this song feels quite a bit more Rock too, sweet piece. 흙 (Dirt) features some great trippy psychedelic melodies and synth twists and effects, male and female vocals and his this great kind of fairground twisted circus kind of vibe to it that the best of classic 60s psychedelic music has, very nice. It's very trippy and fun at times but also just as dynamic and varied in its progression and vocals as the other songs. Quite an experience. 무소식 (No Answer) continues the psychedelic theme from the previous song somewhat though with a less explosive sound, the song seems to continously build with a warm sweet atmosphere and some great synth and sound effects in the second half adding to the male and female vocals. The song does remind me a bit of MGMT in its sound actually, nice psychedelic folk kind of piece and a great closing song of this album, though at the end I wish there was more as it ends when you'd hoped it would continue, still a good song though.

무너지기 (Crumbling) by 공중도둑 (Mid-Air Thief) is an excellent South Korean Psychedelic Folk / Folktronica album with a sweet mellow but also often vibrant cinematic kind of peaceful introverted ambience. The songs are really well written and vocal and instrumental performances are great as well as the excellent top-notch productions. This is a great warm cozy but also adventurous listen of an album also for listeners who don't understand the lyrics and 신혜정's Album Cover matches the music rather well and is good invitation to listen. Recommended music for people looking for Korean folk music in a more independent, psychedelic minded direction with less of a mainstream / pop sound to it but sounding more local / experimental. Also definitely recommended for anyone looking for great independent music from Asia, this is one of my favourite reviewed releases of 2019 too. Recommended album.

Sonic Picks 11

aRF: attic (2018)

Reviewed format: Self-released Digital Mini Album

I'm onto the next Sonic Pick in 2019 already with this self-released Mini Album by aRF titled attic. This Mini Album was released last year and it was recommended to me by aRF after I received a positive reply from him when I sent him my review of the field recordings album Stambuł (2018) under his name Rafal Flejter which I posted yesterday. Unlike Stambuł attic is an album of music, in this case cinematic, droney and glitchy experimental music and all of the 5 tracks on attic are created using samples from the film Attic by Henry Tod which gives it quite a unique abstract but also deep sound. In the download of this Mini Album you can find the 5 tracks in above CD quality 16-bit/48kHz files as well as a good resolution file of the album (in a rectangular format, similar to a cassette tape cover).

attic is again a pretty short album at only 31 minutes but it uses the time rather well and all 5 tracks develop and progress musically and sonically in rather immersive, captivating and unique ways. First track opus_027 also has a music video attached to it (which you can find here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m009ZRUuv64), I couldn't find who made it in the description but it's definitely a pretty nice visual accompaniment to the music featuring occult-themed mirrored and filtered images of a girl moving creating new mysterious shapes in an orange tint as well as images of skulls and masks. Definitely more like music visuals rather than a storytelling video but it works well in that manner. The music itself is a curious mixture between sound collage, glitch and Industrial Techno influenced bass and distorted Noise that does feel influenced by some parts of the post-internet and manipulation techniques used in Vaporwave and its many subgenres as well deconstructed club music. opus_027 switches between whishing chopped and mangled glitched up music samples and a part in the second half that features mysterious high pitched swishy synths and glockenspiel tingling sounds. Despite the highly fragmented aesthetic of the sound and abstract rhythm and composition of the music it still carries a lot of atmospheric cinematic ambience with it and the sampled melody is recognizable even with the heavy glitching and post-2000s Autechre styled heavy rhythmic pumping sidechain compression used on the sample. The track also features some rather low pitched saturated industrial sounding drums, falling into that contemporary tape culture kind of lo-fi vibe that I really like as well as rumbling very low bass. This low bass is audible on pretty much all 5 tracks on attic adding an additional thumpy cinematic sub bass to the mixture. opus_05 dials up the Industrial Techno influence a bit in its bassy kicks and minimal noisy synth percussion and features some great vocal sampling in the first half adding a great creepy ambience to the music. In the second half of the track there is a nice distorted and reverberated synth melody adding some more dramatic tension to the music. Indeed, all 5 pieces on this Mini Album actually also sound like tracks on a film soundtrack with their continous ambience and tense progression throughout, making attic also meta in a way (Mini Album using samples from a film sounds like a film soundtrack again). opus_024 is also tense in its atmosphere featuring sharp distorted reverberated drones as well as strangely manipulated nature field recordings and dialogue samples (which sound English a bit but I can't quite discern the language exactly). In the second half the music goes into this psychedelic kind of tribal ambient vibe with overtone like sounds as well as a continous strong drone carrying the music forward, great stuff. opus_025 is the most abstract and minimal track on the Mini Album, I'd say it's a "Glitchy Drone" piece, based around various reverberated glitched up music and voice samples. It's the longest piece on the album and does perhaps require a bit more patience to get into, but its slow and gradual progression is rewarding and the second half features a nicely mysterious but also brighter sounding mixture of "cleaner" music samples combined with warm synth tones. opus_026 is the closing track and it features more straight sampling and glitching, looping buzzy music samples that also feature electric piano as well as manipulating them further overtime, this track's got a bit more of a classic Glitch style in it as well as Noise effects too, great music again and a nice finale of this mini album.

attic by aRF is a great Mini Album of surreal experimental music that over its 31 minutes playing time achieves to create a great deep and imaginative cinematic journey that feels like somewhat like a mashup of a soundtrack and its own deconstruction in new music. A great and unfortunately overlooked release (I was the only person who's bought and added to their collection on Bandcamp at the time of writing it seems) that definitely deserves to be discovered by anyone looking for quality unique experimental electronic music as well as anyone feeling in the mood for surreal cinematic instrumental music.