For the past twelve years Josh Landes has helmed the highly influential noise project Limbs Bin. Nestling into the margins between oscillating noise and punishing grind, Limbs Bin records like Bliss Tech, Total Anguish and Summertime Blues have become blueprints for contemporary noise artists who value the ecstatic and cathartic immediacy of Landes’ performances and …
JOSH LANDES – PROVINCIAL ELECTRONICS (ARKEEN, 2020) Read More »
The New York-based visual artist, musician and composer’s latest release is an invigorating three-song blast that’s both intensely creative and surprisingly accessible. Even the quickest glance at Brandon Locher’s CV would make any artist exhausted, jealous, or both. As a visual artist, the Johnstown, PA native’s works include – among other things – the hyper-detailed …
Surfacer, the new EP by Boston, MA based Premises present a big tent approach to electronic music that marries mathy apreggios, layered breakbeats and organic percussion with strong melodic pop sensibilities and ambient shadings. Premises long reach delivers on the promises that bands like Arms & Sleepers, DNTEL and The American Dollar started 10 + …
I received this beautifully laid out package in the mail containing the cassette of Figures of Devotion 2020 album Rhapsody in Travel. Included with the cassette were several gorgeous photos of unmarked land and cityscapes. According to the scant info card it is noted that these songs were composed and recorded in Texas, Wisconsin, Utah …
FIGURES OF DEVOTION – RHAPSODY IN TRAVEL (HURT COLLECTION, 2020) Read More »
The Portuguese experimental artist finds a home on Orange Milk Records, but his unique style establishes him as a bit of an outlier of that acclaimed label. It’s evident even from the cover art that Luis Pestana is traveling on a slightly different road from his labelmates on the trailblazing Ohio-based Orange Milk imprint with …
The new album from the New Jersey-based composer/musician/educators – like all his music – a highly ambitious work and may be his magnum opus. Until the next one. It’s impossible to write about Chris Opperman – composer, pianist, trumpet player, music professor – without mentioning Frank Zappa. An avid fan of the late musician, Opperman …
CHRIS OPPERMAN – CHAMBER MUSIC FROM HELL (Purple Cow, 2020) Read More »
The latest album from the New York City-based guitarist, composer and improviser is full of stark vocals and fractured, atonal guitar wizardry, resulting in a fascinating and adventurous listening experience. I’m sure the world is almost as sick of “2020 is a shitshow” analogies in arts reviews as they are of 2020 itself, but bear …
ANDREW SMILEY – LOOMING AS LIGHT TORN (SELF-RELEASED, 2020) Read More »
Greh Holger is a busy man. Between the Noisextra podcast that he hosts alongside Mike and Tara Connelly and his label, Chondritic Sound, the guy has his hands full. You could be forgiven for forgetting that he is also the sole force behind the industrial-noise act, Hive Mind. “Elysian Alarms” is the first release of …
HIVE MIND – ELYSIAN ALARMS (DIFFICULT INTERACTIONS, 2020) Read More »
The Nevada-based outfit Wizard Colors lets loose with an extended track full of noise, chaos, and surprising warmth. The official purpose of “0 1N20 BURN1N6 S9ACE 0,” the recently released track from noise duo Wizard Colors, is actually delivered in the form of a question: “How many hours of guitar droning and synth swelling does …
Wizard Colors – 0 1N20 BURN1N6 S9ACE 0 (Slow Start Records, 2020) Read More »
The inventive trumpeter smashes more boundaries with an album that takes jazz into exciting and multifaceted territories. You can even smell it. In the age of pandemic and quarantine, live music performances are one of many aspects of everyday life that have been largely sacrificed. Fortunately, many artists continue to write, record and release …
STEPH RICHARDS – SUPERSENSE (Northern Spy, 2020) Read More »