Category Archives: UPDATE

DBA119 Gang Wizard – ‘So Excited’ DL
If the X-Men have done anything truly striking to transform the ancient legend of the phoenix, it is to insure that we must always be surprised by its return. Despite the predictability of its definition. Gang Wizard is no different. Their return in 2012, after nearly a 4 year disappearance, was something most never saw coming. But here they are, truly reborn. Still masterminded by their founder, Mike Landucci, the band is now populated by his own teen sons. But while the internet has completely changed the face of DIY from complete brutality to total chill zones, Gang Wizard’s approach still proudly stands on its rickety and splintered legs. So this release is in honor of a band that has never compromised, presented in glorious, free digital to help pass the tradition on to a new generation. The album, called ‘So Excited’ even includes a video performance recorded direct to ipad. Thats modern, right?

Gang Wizard – ‘Hood Rip’ square lathe 7″
The 2nd limited edition release from the new garde, 2012 reborn version of Gang Wizard. 4 brand new rippers on square shaped 7″s, handcut in Olympia, WA. Only 20 available, so you know the deal.

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Hobo Cubes – ‘Slow Summer Soul’ C30
Hobo Cubes is Montreal’s Francesco De Gallo. On Slow Summer Soul, he digs away at the concept of summer listlessness. Approaching the solstice time stretches its legs, and then gives way to increasingly shorter summer days. There’s a point in the evening, as the sun is setting, where its colour intensifies and imparts a recognition that nothing lasts forever, not even summer. That’s where this music lives. Exquisitely assembled, the cover features printed transparency overlays on shiny gold cardstock. To hold this in your hand is to hold a fragment of a true pimp’s soul. Pro-duplicated edition of 50.

Reedbeds – ‘Heirloom Rust Garden’ C40
Reedbeds is Sacramento’s Carter Mullin. Ornate guitar loops transport us to a botanical garden for a nature walk at dawn. Appropriately titled, Heirloom Rust Garden takes long deep breaths. These waves of sound gently construct spiritual origami. Inner wellness ensues. Lovingly designed, the cover features printed transparency overlays on textured silver cardstock. It must be held to be appreciated. Pro-duplicated edition of 50.

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sicsic030 – Flamingo Creatures/Limpe Fuchs Trampelpfad split
Ruth-Maria Adam and Ronnie Oliveras have been around as part of the Datashock collective for quite a few years now, but their adventures as a duo are mostly undiscovered. With the help of electronics, bells, a violin and various percussion instruments the couple develops musical dialogues that speak to you in the most handsome way one can think of. Like Hans-Joachim Roedelius waltzing with Joan La Barbara while Smegma play (quietly) in the back. Limpe Fuchs’ a legend. From her early days as part of the Anima Sound duo to her current body of work there’s only one way to describe her approach towards music: radical, free and fearless. These live recordings proof that using only her voice and a few self-built percussion instruments she’s creating an atmosphere of maximum attention towards her audience. We don’t know how she does the trick, but we recommend the music cut to tape to re-enact the magic!

sicsic031 – Günter Schlienz – ‘Tape Studies’
Günter Schlienz is a quiet handed modular scientist, building his own instruments to create quality cosmic sounds. But we won’t spill the beans about the technical details and the specific process it took to cook up this high octane ambient music. All we are allowed to share ist that it’s all about Reel-To-Reel and Echos n’ Delay and Modular Synthesizers – but the exact recipe’s locked up in a secret Hobbykeller-Laboratory located somewhere unknown in Stuttgart. All you can do is: get some of Günter’s sonic narcotics, plug in your headphones and travel space without leaving the comfort zone of your couch!

sicsic032 – Dozens – ‘Casually Baroque’
Dozens is Ryan Connolly (Sundrips) and Francesco De Gallo (Hobo Cubes) delivering sunbaked tunes made of guitars and electronics. Perfect music to chill in the twilight on the porch, having a beer in your hand and your feet in a bucket of cold water. And there’s this sound all around you, like fireflies, glowing.

sicsic 033 – mise_en_scene/Voigt vs. Gerendás split
Imagine being locked in an anechoic dark room. The void space around you doesn’t respond to any of your actions – and the only thing you begin to notice is the sound of your brainwaves. More and more your inner ear is hooked to a pulsating rhythm emerging from deep within your head. If that doesn’t freak you out you’re ready for some mise_en_scene. In comparison to being challenged by frequencies from within, Thomas Gerandás (aka Skullorian Sound Sculptures) and sicsics-own Daniel Voigt chose a more comfortable way and exchanged and manipulated each other’s soundfiles to end up with two pieces of damaged noise. A slightly deranged musical dialogue for your listening pleasure. Deep fried Hering on a crushed skull! Nothing tastes alike!

sicsic034 – Je Suis Le Petit Chevalier – ‘A Guide To The Sun’
Like a silver stripe on an endless horizon Je Suis Le Petit Chevalier’s music’s signifying relief. Within her minimal dark musings Felicia Atkinsons’ buried some light. It’s not bursting out, but you can catch a glimpse of it if you wait patient enough. So take your time, head towards the horizon and you’ll be rewarded!

sicsic035 – Rambutan + Parashi – ‘Lesser Halogens’
Eric Hardiman (Rambutan) and Mike Griffin (Parashi) teaming up as a duo for the first time to perform some kind of synth-noir-music for the digital age: Dark, drifting and appealing. Music to sit alienated in front of your flatscreen dating a chat-room-femme-fatale. But she’s not in the mood and your without sleep for days, so you both have a smoke without smelling each other. Good clean fun, right?

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RM11 Husnaan – ‘Recordings of Names and Misled Trains’ C37
Decomposing synth crackle and zap from Indonesia’s Duto Hardono. A sure-handed display of sound and space. Recorded in real time using a Nakamichi CR-1 and a Nakamichi LX3 onto Cobalt Type II cassette. Edition of 50.

RM12 Berber Ox – ‘At Sea’ C41
Submerged soundscapes and industrial clatter from David Rutledge. Recorded in real time using a Nakamichi CR-1 and a Nakamichi LX3 onto Cobalt Type II cassette. Edition of 50.

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GR229: Lidless Eye – ‘Stops A Beating Heart’ C32
4 track recordings of short lived fried and rewired electronics experiments. Strange homemade effect boxes and rewired radios melting together into malfunction. Color art, edition of 20 copies.

GR230: Diagram A – ‘R & D’ C60
New homemade electronic mayhem from this long-running homemade carnage manipulator. This tape is a demonstration of his hew arm device. I don’t know what it looks like, but if you seen this creep’s gear before, you know it’s probably some huge, loud, and nasty circuitry. Double-sided color art, edition of 30 copies.

GR232: Violent Mood Swings #2 zine + CDr
Second collection of warped xerox collages. Confusing melting images rendered and re-rendered. 8.5 x 11 zine comes with a disc of 4 track electronics. Edition of 20 copies. 

GR234: Slump – ‘Porton Down’ C30
New swampy lo-fi recordings from this UK jammer behind the Beartown Records label. Long electronic winds and loud weird unknowns. Color art, edition of 20 copies.

GR235: Resin Injection C32
Harsh electronics and eerie synthesizer from Bradley Dixon (Rose Window) and Knox Mitchell. One side mixed by each artist. Lots of  electronic squirms and heavy synth. Color art with insert, edition of 20 copies.

GR236: Some Larval Dream About Smothering C90
Archival recordings by the duo of Daryl Fraser (Vullmoxx) and Ryan Oppermann (Redrot). Pulsating synth rhythms  and glitched samples mixed in with some gross electronics. Double-sided color art, edition of 20 copies.

GR237: Peter Kastner – Kakawaka – Kommissar Hjuler Un Frau – ‘Whole Lotta Love’ C60
Essential reissue of a very limited (11 copies to be exact) and  out of print CD-R released on  Der Schöne Hjuler-Memorial-Fond. Side A contains a collaborative live performance and tribute to Led Zeppelin. Side B contains unreleased solo tracks from all artists involved. Some of the best KHJ-MB recordings to date! Color art.

GR238: Kommissar Hjuler Und Frau And The Kommissar Hjuler Allstar Band – ‘Wanderup Indoor Riot’ C60
Reissue of a limited CD on their own Der Schöne Hjuler-Memorial-Fond label, this recording captures a strange conversation-like session ending with Mama Bear delivering some intense screaming. Side B contains the previously unheard tracks JHM Fruchbarkeistritual and Who Knows What?. Always weird sounds from this insane fluxus duo. Color art, edition of 30 copies.

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DDP 1971.022 Wolfskull – ‘Stink Void’ C90
Ed. of 100. This is some heavy, heavy shit. Not heavy in stacks-of-amps, doom sort of way — though you will feel doomed while listening to this best-of collection. New Zealand’s Wolfskull are heavy in the sense that if you heard this oozing out of your cousin’s basement bedroom you’d immediately hold an intervention. Muttered vocals, wandering guitar lines and plenty of bad vibes, Wolfskull are audio equivalent to that small town that you just keep driving through, even though you’re already running fumes. This is what they do. This is what they sound like. This anthology culls together the band’s best tracks, chosen by Wolfskull (and Root Don Lonie for Cash) member Clayton Noone is a harrowing listen that evokes strange forest rituals and small-town inhabitants gone mad from the heat. w/ Download.

DDP 1971.023 Fletcher Pratt – ‘Dub Sessions Vol. 2’ C30
Ed. of 75. Winnipeg’s mad scientist of hallucinatory visuals and hot-wired electronics returns with his second volume in his Dub Sessions series. And what a workout this one is. The aptly titled “Huge Dub” begins with a classic Dre keyboard lead and a stuttering hi-hat straight outta present-day dirty south rap while a spacey dub progression floats in the background. It sounds like Pratt’s replaced his bong water with Purple Drank and stayed up all night re-imagining and re-working dub and southern fried rap. The results are seamless. Volume 2 touches on the all the trademark touchstones of dub, trippy reverb and delay and trance-inducing basslines, and combines them with thick, heavy synths, before chopping-and-screwing the whole mess and throwing in some big booty bass for good measure. Yet Pratt also shows some restraint and almost cinematic sensibilities — the true mark of master. Mellow enough for late-night drift-off sessions and heavy enough for beat addicts, Pratt knows when you’ve had just enough herb and makes you get off that beanbag chair and hit the dance floor. w/ Download

DDP 1971.024 JLK//Babysitter C30
Ed. of 75. This cassette brings together Montreal artist Jane Kasowicz (Velvet Chrome) and Victoria’s Babysitter. Culled from merely a few days of jamming, the sounds within are at once loose and spellbinding. The aptly titled “Buddies” starts things off with an almost delta blues guitar raga while Jane howls like voodoo priestess luring wayward townsfolk to her fireside ritual. The 10+ minute “Wanderings” turns the identifiable structures and chords of the previous tracks on their heads: Droning guitars, stuttering drums, murky electronics and multi-layered, delay-soaked vocals swirl into a thick, swampy audio gumbo. w/ download.

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Musculus – ‘Yang Dynasty’ C40
Full circle mystery, multi-layered group venture into different territory and offer a blissed capture of sound; hinting,waiting, enveloping.

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HEXAGON ONE: Forgotten Light – ‘Distances’ CS $5
Two 20 minute tracks of droning, subtly shifting euphoric furniture music. Opening track “Clairvoyance” emerges like a flashlight through a dense fog and swells to a clipping maximum, then closes slowly and fades away as if nothing ever happened.

HEXAGON TWO: Datavis & Forgotten Light – ‘Prism Projector’ CS $8
Both artists join forces on a split record that is actually intertwined together to interplay upon their respective ideas and sounds. 45 minutes of slow faded ambience to soundtrack a sluggish mindstate.

HEXAGON THREE: Datavis – ‘Distant Space’ $7
Minimal synth improvisations for tape driven by Datavis. All four tracks extend through space and time at light-speed or with the utmost ease and patience, a distinction to be left to the imagination during passive listening.

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Bitter Fictions – ‘Nos 1 & 2’ C40 $6
Two EPs of mostly-improvised guitar loop compositions from Canadian writer/musician Devin Friesen. no. 1 is the louder of the two EPs, compiling four sequential live improvisations and one extra track of patiently focused guitar layering–imagine elements of a Rhys Chatham or Glenn Branca piece put together in a bedroom instead of a concert hall. no. 2 focuses more on mood, gradually shifting from stargazing harmonics into foggy smears of bummed-out feedback. Edition of 50, pro-dubbed/printed tapes.

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12000TREES – ‘Vol. 1’ C60
12000TREES is an improvisational type of band from Brooklyn, NY. Its members include people of different musical background as well as not professionally versed musicians. The sounds come from a variety of instruments – drums, bass, guitars, keyboardsd and synths, vocals, violin, sax, trumpet, trombone, percussions of diferent sorts; some combined and modified with electronic, electric and digital devices. Over time, 12000TREES core members have welcomed a rotating cast of guests and temporary participants. The music produced on stage and at practices is highly energetic. A a sense of a communion is created . Live shows can be surprising, introspective, viceral. 12000TREES tracks come from improvised sessions at a practice space, where the idea that stick out are reprised and re-worked for live shows with usually a minimal non-limiting structural guides. 12000TREES has just released their first recording, limited to a 100 cassette tapas, through their own newly created label – TORRENT CULT TAPES, with which they hope to have monthly releases of like minded people..  12000TREES Tape Vol. 1 is 60 min of great spacey psychedelic emotional music!

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