Greg Davis and Sébastien Roux - 2008 - Merveilles

Genre: Laptop Folk, Electronic, Psychedelic
Label: Ahornfelder (DE)

Greg Davis and Sébastien Roux are back with their second collaborative album following the acclaimed release “Paquet surprise”. “Merveilles”, translated from the French word as wonderland, describes the album very fitting as the songs have a very illustrative quality. Where the previous album relied a bit more on sweet melodies and quick changes “Merveilles” explores different sound worlds in depth and illuminates a terrain of diverse emotional scenarios. Silent passages of field recordings are combined with subtle harmonic layers, interrupted by sudden noise eruptions and contrasted by folk like guitar melodies and very concrete sounds, often leaving the listener wondering what the origin of this tone might be.

Tracklisting

1. Geneva
   
2. London
   
3. San Francisco
   
4. Eugene
   
5. Aalst

Try it - Buy it - MicePays (Greg Davis, Sébastien Roux)

The Balustrade Ensemble - 2007 - Capsules

Genre: Steampunk Ambient, Neo Folk, Electronica
Label: Dynamophone (US)

Very nice soundscapes, some kind of victorian ambient. The Soundtrack for Good Friday. Enjoy!

An otherworldy collection of adroitly-crafted pieces of dense, acoustic guitar pickings, mellotron, orchestron, claviola, cello, piano, pedal steel, and voice (Wendy Allen). Delicate and sometimes spooky, Capsules is like the lost soundtrack to a Brothers Quay film, a collection of lovely, brittle compositions viewed through a hazy, antique looking-glass.

Tracklisting

1. Glorianders
   
2. The Drowning Calm 
   
3. Tangle In Delirium 
   
4. Synnøve Skeie
   
5. Incarnadine
   
6. Fall Away Into Darkness
   
7. A Long Fetch Over
   
8. The Museums Of Sleep
   
9. Crushed Pears
   
10. Szól A Zene
    

Try it - Buy it - MicePays

Casino Versus Japan - 2000 - Go Hawaii

Genre: Ambient, House, TripHop
Label: Wobblyhead
Similar Artists: Boards of Canada, Aphex Twin Ambient Works

This got that special sounds from the end of nineties, or it always reminds me on that. Chilling beats, relaxing ambient textures and that special organ sounds that drops in. If you listen to It's very Sunny, you know what I mean. If that Droids record take you to the eighties, this will bring you back to the nineties!

Tracklisting

1. Theme 
   
2. It's Very Sunny 
   
3. Late For School 
   
4. Local Forecast 
   
5. Metrobolt 
   
6. Dielectric Saints 
   
7. We Are You 
   
8. Over Island 
   
9. The Larp 
   
10. Medery 
    
11. Warm Windows 
    
12. Go Hawaii 
    

Try it - Buy it - MicePays

A Broken Consort - The Shape Leaves (2006); Crow Autumn (2007)

Genre: Drone, Freefrom, Psych Folk
Label: Sustain-Release (UK)

Similar Artists: Thuja, TwinSisterMoon, Nature Snow Buildings

Shimmering freeform mantras on violin and sparkling guitar pickings. Very organic sound which make the time stands still. Checkout the labelwebsite to see the full beauty of his releases.

The music consists of long-spun acoustic soundscapes - drones and melodic repetitions, but with a great depth of sound. Most prominent are guitars, percussion, and various other bowed and strummed strings. The result is at the same time familiar, rooted in the earth, but also far from everyday experience. A wonderful musical depiction of the mystic depths contained in natural landscapes with only a hint of cultivation.

Tracklisting - The Shape Leaves

1. In The Hanged Air 
   
2. A Momentary Sun 
   
3. And All Their Silver & Gold 
   
4. For Nothing 
   
5. The Longing Day 
   
6. Untitled
   

Try it

Tracklisting - Crow Autumn

1. Crow Autumn 

Try it

Buy it - MicePays

Kranioclast - Can I Talk Or S..., 7" (1997); Cranioclast - Rats Can Coil Cats Can Roil (1990) 12" EP

Genre: Psychedelic, Ambient, Post-Industrial
Label: Sonaria (PL) / CoC (GER)

Very dark and trippy soundscapes, with insect sounds, cats and dogs and oriental melodies. Both are one of the best records by this obscure german ambient project.

Tracklisting - Can I Talk Or S...

1. Honey For The Bees 
   
2. No Caveman Bites The Dog

Try it

Tracklisting - Rats Can Coil Cats Can Roil

1. Rats Can Coil 
   
2. Cats Can Roil 

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Kallabris - A Smile For Brandon, Tape (1990) + Considération Sur / Sous Le Café, 7" (2001)

Genre: Freak Folk, Home Recording, Ambient, Drone
Label: Jazztone (GER), Genesungswerk (GER)

Similar Artists: Cranioclast

In general, Kallabris is a german post-industrial, ambient, drone project, related to the much more obscure Cranioclast collective. Kallabris released a lot of strange, limited records and here are two, I really love.

A Smile For Brandon is a rare tape I bought in the early nineties and maybe my first contact to that nowadays called Freak Folk genre. In these times it was just a kind of obscure DIY homerecording, released in the tapescene. A bunch of tiny songs with acoustic guitar, voice and some additional noises. Nice and full of tapehiss.

The second one Considération Sur / Sous Le Café  is a conceptual 7" record about coffee, and it comes with a text about that. It's kind of a very strange Coffeehouse music (whatever this means). Sparly Piano tunes, a voice and some shimmering guitar feedbacks laying in the background. Enjoy them!

Tracklisting - A Smile For Brandon

1. Movement III
   
2. Nous Nous Faisons, Bichette?
   
3. Flutes Of Jericho
   
4. The Night Mood
   
5. Nine To Six
   
6. Movement IV
   
7. Something More
   
8. Season Of Fire
   
9. Mme. Edwarda
   
10. Movement V
    
11. Kill Me!
    
12. Autumn
    
13. So What?
    
14. Raindrops
    
15. Salty Water
    
16. My Garden
    
17. Party It Up!
    
18. Too Deep To Be Named
    
19. The 3rd Way
    

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Tracklisting - Considération Sur / Sous Le Café

1. Considération Sur Le Café 
   
2. Considération Sous Le Café 

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Bidibop - Snapshot (2005)

Genre: Electronic, Space Pop
Label: Carte Postale

Similar Artists: Domotic

Bidibop was part of the superb un automne à Lob-Nor released some beautiful solo records.

Old synths sounds to earlies glitches, guitar and sound treatments, are part of the bidibop's textures glittering music which only aim is pop.

Tracklisting

1. Stars Hunter 
   
2. First Step In Snow 
   
3. Contact 
   
4. Missur 
   
5. Snapshot 
   
6. Ding 
   
7. Apesanteur 
   
8. Second Step In Snow 
   
9. Today's Butterflies Still There In My Dreams 
   

Try it - Buy it - MicePays

Vertonen - The Ocean Is Gone, The Ship Is Next (2003)

Genre: Drone
Label: Ground Fault Recordings

Vertonen is Chicago experimental music veteran Blake Edwards and this CD continues an ongoing exploration of turntable-fueled drones. The opening track's title is self-explanatory: "untitled for air organ and turntable motor". Recorded live on the radio in Chicago, this piece is a fourteen minute long deep and dense mix of beautiful bass tones and thick breathy hums playing endless phase games with each other. On the second piece, a very heavy speaker-rattling bass tone loops through the beginning as metal-percussion sounds slowly cycle in the background. Scratchy vinyl sounds and dense ambient tones continue throughout as some recognizable vinyl-sourced sounds emerge- like a looped horn-line perhaps. the regular sound of the loop disturbs the drone atmosphere a little, adding some humor to a track that doesn't seem to need any. The next piece, "Four chambers plus their various fluids" kicks out the noise from the get go- fast and loud cycling noise whirring and flanging endlessly. Hissy field recorded sounds predominate as the track fades out to silence. "Soma Trio Study (2)" is the shortest cut one here at 5 minutes and could have used a little more time to develop. The sounds at play are delicate and melodic slowly evolving loops drifting in and out of phase- a bit like Philip Jeck, perhaps and much more romantic than the claustrophobic sounds on the previous pieces. Final track begins with warbly locked groove piano sounds eventually overtaken by a darker, machine loop that slowly fades in as the piano plays on. The mix of endless drone frequencies and more loopish vinyl sounds works wonderfully throughout this disc. -- Angbase

Tracklisting

1. Untitled For Air Organ And Turntable Motor 
   
2. The Last Great Circus Of Desperate Heritage 
   
3. Four Chambers Plus Their Various Fluids 
   
4. Soma Trio Study (#2) 
   
5. Harbor Surfacant

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Art Of Primitive Sound - Musical Instruments From Prehistory - The Paleolithic (1993)

Genre: natural sounds, ambient, prehistoric, obscure
Label: Hic Sun Leones (IT)

"As the title suggests, this peculiar project commit to disk recreation of 'music' from the Paleolithic period. Involved in the project is Stefano Musso, of Alio Die, and Walter Maioli, a researcher of the Archaeology of Music." Equilibrium

Tracklisting:
1 The Dance Of Leaves (4:09)
2 Flautes (4:30)
2a Aerial Harmonics
2b Curved Melodies
2c In Flight
3 Eagle Bone For The Ghost Dance (1:25)
4 Flying Rhombs (4:57)
4a Horn (Africa)
4b Bamboo (Nias)
4c Wood (India)
4d Wood (Australia)
5 The Horn, The Tortoise, The Bow, The Flintstone (3:44)
6 Sonorous Stones In The Cave (6:08)
6a Stactite Gong
6b The "Organ"
7 River Stones (1:49)
8 Vegetable Seeds: Jungle Voices (5:11)
Performer - Asaga , Luca Migliaccio
9 The Spirit Of The Marshed (5:17)
10 Sea Language, Shells (5:36)
11 Amazonian Finds (4:38)
11a River Shells
11b Tucan Beaks
11c Coleopter Eleters

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un automne à Lob-Nor - s/t (2001)

Second Album of this french group. Very clear and dimensional sound and beautiful tunes enriched with digital clicks and grainy soundscapes. Really each track on this record is full of pure beauty.

Label: les disques Serpentine - chronowax

Genre: Post-Rock, Electronic

Tracklisting

1. polar
   
2. boss A
   
3. katg
   
4. mugwump
   
5. wltz
   
6. rain trans
   

Try it - Buy it (the last copies!)

Bonus:

Grab here a full liveset from 2001 in Amiens

and on top, the last existing recordings of un automne à Lob-Nor where released as free download EP on tri postal netlabel under the title Bye Bye. enjoy!

Ribbon Effect - Slip (2000)

A wonderful record for sunday mornings. Some noisy soundscapes, lovely tunes,  improvisations, organs, delayed guitars, happy drumboxing - all the stuff to make you feel good. Best soundtrack to start your day ;-).

Label: Roomtone Records
Genre: Electronic, Ambient, Post-Rock

Tracklisting:

1. Slip 1
   
2. Slip 2
3. Slip 3
   
4. Slip 4
   
5. Slip 5
   

Try it - Buy it

Some more Info:

Slippery ambient soundscapes, gurgles, and and rhythmic guitar vibrations abound.

Ribbon Effect was formed in 1998 by Bill Talsma, Jacob Ross, and Danielle Malkoff, who met while working at Chicago's Experimental Sound Studio. The band produced their first self-titled recording combining the practice of studio manipulation with live performance in June, 1998. 1999 saw this four song EP followed by Danielle contributing the vocals to "Seafrance Cezanne" on Tarwater's Silur album, and the recording of more Ribbon Effect material. Later the same year, the band collaborated with visual artist Joel Ross on Slip, a multimedia show held in Chicago. Slip's presentation combined the trio's live performance with six video monitors projecting moving images that centered on an unidentified urban landscape.

This year, the instrumental tracks originally composed for the series of live performances were enhanced and recorded in the studio for SLIP, Ribbon Effect's debut full-length CD. The band's music is haunting and cinematic, alternately evoking stasis and motion. An interplay of chiming guitars, dub-inflected bass, lingering keyboard melodies and electronics gives way to desolate tones and barren soundscapes, which in turn evolve into pronounced rhythmic patterns. At times, SLIP recalls the exploratory studio excursions of Fridge, Pluramon, Pan American, Augustus Pablo, This Heat, and Rome. At times it does not. Enjoy!