…to all our (Indian) friends and friends of India around the globe,
to the international community of listeners and music lovers,
to all the great vocal / instrumental musicians, composers and DJs,
to the passionate event organizers, booking agencies and music labels,
to analytical music scientists, profound teachers & pedagogues
and to our colleagues from press & medias
a very HAPPY & SUCCESSFULLY NEW YEAR 2013 !!!!!

It’s easy to be bleak about new music releases, the vast quantities of new work spreading before you in their sameness like a blizzard – plenty of particles, but all a white wash. When feelings like that hit you – or the depressed mood that might strike during midwinter in the far reaches of the Northern Hemisphere – there’s a solution. You can warm yourself with good friends in intimate surroundings.

And that’s what Iceland’s Bedroom Community collective and label are all about. This group has literally assembled a group of close friends for “intimate” musical connections. Getting in on their releases feels accordingly like gathering with that circle, in beautiful, reflective, finely-crafted music that’s unafraid of drawing lines between electronic music, classical, and experimental traditions. And yes, that includes looking to acoustic instrumentation and concert music alongside digital and purely electronic media. The founders were originally Valgeir Sigurðsson, with Nico Muhly and Ben Frost, with a few additions since then.

December is the perfect time to catch up if you like what you here, as an exquisite new Yule mix is free with other records. Let’s listen to a few samples.

This year, a new Yule compilation is an exclusive in December, complete with make-your-own gift CD kits. Yes, I’m a bit late for Christmas, but I’m ready to keep gift giving going. New Year’s. Orthodox Christmas. My birthday. All ahead in the next three weeks. Track listing:

00:00 Daníel Bjarnason – “Enn fagnar heimur” / Scanner Remix
04:50 Nico Muhly feat. Dawn Landes – “The Brown Girl” / Valgeir Sigurðsson Remix
10:57 Paul Corley – “Sidings”
16:38 Puzzle Muteson – “True Faith”
19:59 Ben Frost & Daníel Bjarnason – Theme From “Djúpið”
23:33 Nadia Sirota – “Twelve Days Of Christmas”
28:49 Sam Amidon – “The Sad Gnome” + “Prodigal Son 2007 Demo”
34:48 Ben Frost – “Bergþórugata 2006″
37:12 Nico Muhly – “Radio Bells”
41:28 Daníel Bjarnason – “Enn fagnar heimur”
43:48 Valgeir Sigurðsson – “Gleðilegt jóðl”

Yule is in the Air

From last year’s Yule mix, Sam Amidon with How Come That Blood (FM Belfast Remix) video, as featured on NME (PS, funny to run across Sam’s name, as I met Sam years ago in New York):

Another great sample is Daníel Bjarnason’s “Montauk in February Remix” off Spindrift:

But Yule aside, now’s as good a time as any to mention some wonderful recent Bedroom Community releases, each of which deserve our consideration as we look back over 2012.

There’s Nico Muhly’s “Drones”, the latest from this brilliant, boundary-pushing composer. Ignore the title: this is post-minimal virtuosity, sometimes rollicking in nods to the likes of Rzewski, sometimes static sculpture, sometimes rock-and-roll. It’s, vitally, never timid:

Paul Corley’s debut “Disquiet” is a masterpiece, sparse and unadorned without ever being austere, a chillingly-beautiful set of instrumental meditations:

Finally, “Architecture of Loss” by Valgeir Sigurðsson is an exquisite, often programmatic work in instrumental and digital processes. Built on a ballet, the sense of movement and gesture is intact even in its sparest moments.

Bedroom Community remains a label to track, so I’ll continue to do so. Enjoy:

http://www.bedroomcommunity.net/

PK: In the digital age, subscription services or “all-you-can-eat” music gives passionate listeners nothing if not flexibility and a wealth of music. But they can also distance music lovers from labels they care about – and the reliance on streaming threatens to sever the special relationship you have with albums that are really special.

Drip.fm is different. Founded by Ghostly International, it has the affordable monthly subscription rate – but with actual high-quality downloads you keep. First launched with some of Ghostly’s boutique-quality electronic music, it has since expanded to some big names.

Today could be a watershed moment for the service, with two new labels onboard. As Skrillex rides a wave of new dance music (or “bass music”) fans, his indie label project OWSLA is embracing the subscription model with their digital-only sub-label OWSLA. Alongside the OWSLA releases, they’ll be using the subscription service to distribute rare and unreleased remixes and edits. You get the lot for $12 a month, starting with two WAV compilations to get you started. Think “stuff you won’t hear on Spotify,” or “stuff you’ll hear on Spotify … but not until later.”

Billboard.com, for one, is taking notice:
Skrillex, OWSLA Label Announce The Nest: Subscription Service

Not a fan of Skrillex and friends? Turbo Recordings is also launching their content on the service. The Montreal-based label founded by Tiga is another boutique shop (see Resident Advisor profile) – just the kind of uniquely-focused music house (and house music) that would seem to fit the model perfectly. It’s the pricing of a big subscription service like Spotify, but with a narrow stream of music rather than “search for a slightly-incomplete catalog of everything.”

Oh, and vinyl lovers, the subscription model could matter to you, too: Drip.fm’s Ghostly channel is holding a vinyl sale today in honor of 12.12.12.

That’s the big picture. For the inside story, though, it’s best to turn to Ghostly’s founder for a view of why, at its heart, the service has more in common with a traditional fan service than generic all-you-can-eat music. It’s about fans rather than, say, cable TV subscribers.

It’s personally exciting for me to see where this has come, because it is an entirely DIY effort. Some music endeavors go out and get a bunch of venture funding and hire developers. Here, Drip.fm co-founder Miguel just sat with his laptop and started coding at the outset – I know, because Miguel and I were sitting working away in the same coffee shop – cum – karaoke bar in Manhattan last year and I got to watch over his shoulder. (I guess the coffee was working. And a lot of people probably just check Facebook. They’ve since grown from those beginnings.)

Interview: Sam

CDM’s Matt Earp was able to catch up with Sam Valenti IV, founder of Ghostly International, at the 11th San Francisco Music Tech conference at Hotel Kabuki in mid-October. He told us about the Drip.FM, the service founded by Ghostly that’s been around for a year and a half, giving us some insight into its genesis and where it might be going.

Can you give me the elevator pitch for what Drip.fm is?

Sure, we think of it as a way for fans to have a subscription service to access recurring premium content from labels they love.

The idea came from the fact that Ghostly, as a label, never had that missing link of a fan club. And we had a lot of fans saying to us “why can’t we just give you our credit card and have you send us stuff – just don’t make us work for it.” Which makes sense because the music industry is kind of stupid – we promote a bunch of stuff and then say “Here’s all this stuff! Now wait three months till you can get it.” Which is sort of backwards – when it finally comes out maybe you won’t even know that it’s out. So we wanted to build something that was really easy and fun and had perks and a sense of community where the super fan could get things for a monthly fee.

And it started with just the Ghostly label?

Yes, starting about 18 months ago (early 2011). And without even really trying, just by using Facebook and Twitter, we were getting people who wanted to join. After about 6 months we thought “OK, this is a real thing, let’s open it up”. And from that came the Drip.fm concept as it is today, where it can handle multiple subscriptions.

And then we went to the labels that we know, the labels that we love, and said “Hey, this thing is working for us, you should try it, there’s no risk, give it a shot.”

How many users were you at when you started approaching other labels?

Maybe a couple hundred. It wasn’t anything earthshaking but there was a lot of people who were getting excited about it, so we said “let’s just show this out”. Especially because as a label you could be involved without a significant amount of time invested – I mean on the product side it was a lot of time for us to build it but as a label it’s just uploading things, and enough labels were enthusiastic that we kept going with it. And we’ve added about one to two labels a month for the last 10 months.

Who are some of the other labels?

So December of 2011 we started with Dirtybird from San Francisco, then Stones Throw was January, and since then it’s been Fools Gold, Mad Decent, Domino, Morr Music, Luaka Bop, Now Again, Jagjaguwar, Dead Oceans, Polyvinyl, 6 Degrees, Planet E, and Wav.Pool – just a smattering of well-curated indies that have different perspectives. We didn’t want it to be a genre thing, it was more about who could tell a good story with their releases, who has a good catalog, and who was good at building fans.

Did you approach those labels or did any of them come to you?

Some came to us, some we went to them. We have a lot of labels who still want to get in but we’re still at the point where we want to make sure it’s a good service, that it’s working well, so we’re onboarding slowly. Because we don’t want to spend all our time answering customer service tickets, we want to focus on making a really good experience and then when we’re ready we’ll open up the doors a little wider.

Who built it and is someone now dedicated to running it full time?

Miguel [Senquiz], my cofounder, who’s the tech lead at Ghostly built the early version, and then our lead developer built a new version. We’re trying to find a balance – the Ghostly team is a strong enough group that so far they’ve been able to put time into Drip without detracting from the Ghostly products because obviously that’s still a big part of our lives. But now we’re entering that next phase where it’s going to be a full-time team and my time gradient is going more towards Drip as well.

Is it the same perks as you described for Ghostly for the other labels as well?

That’s actually a funny question because they’re almost hacking it to make it work for them – giving away concert tickets was one of the label’s ideas, doing Q&As and videos was another label’s idea. So they’re using the service as they want to use it, and that in turn is teaching us how we should be building it.

You’ve already become a platform.

Yeah, we want people to innovate and then tell us “Hey, it would be great if you could do this.” Which is another reason to keep it small for now, so that we can respond to those requests in a timely fashion.

[At this point a tweaker dude turns to us and says “Hey guys, can you do me a favor, I’m sorry to interrupt, I’ve got that machine open, I’m trying to buy a building … and I need to go upstairs, get this scanned and come back, so if someone sits at it, tell ‘em, you know, ‘don’t f***in’ touch it.’” Sam and I do our best to fend off the people that try to interfere with the transaction – which equaled 0.]

How do fans interact with the service – online, or through an app?

Just online for now.

Do you have plans to move into the mobile space?

I think so, but for right now instead of thinking about mobile we’re trying to think about what it is that Drip does for you and then from that figure out if it makes sense to do that on your mobile device. Trying to think of it more holistically – obviously mobile is where everybody is but right now we’re very download-centric, there’s a lot of DJs and audiophiles who like it because they can get high-quality files, so it’s more a question of “What does Drip want to be?” and what lends itself to mobile.

But it sounds like Drip itself is a big part of Ghostly now.

Yeah, it’s one of our revenue streams. Obviously iTunes and streaming is a huge part of the business, as is our web store and licensing. So it’s not like it will chip away at what we’re already doing. But what is nice about it is that building Drip is building a relationship with fans. More and more people are move into streaming businesses, which is obviously a good thing for fans, but we as a label are losing the ability to connect to them. It’s almost like once they’re off the grid they’re off the grid. So having them in the family through Drip we can hear from them, find out what they think and say “Check out this artist we just found.”

So for the Ghostly stuff, have you put tracks on there that aren’t actually signed to Ghostly?

Absolutely, because our schedule is already full but we still like a lot of music, and if the artists are cool with it we say “can we offer this as a Drip exclusive?” And the artists actually get paid for it as well [even if they’re not already signed to Ghostly]. We’ve even been leaned towards signing stuff that we put up on the service and then there was so much feedback from Drip that we were encourage to make a signing.

How many members in total now?

We’re not publishing that info yet because it’s still early days, but we’re really happy with how it’s going. Our hypothesis was that people will pay in advance, and that was kind of a wild notion, because everyone’s like “music’s free, it’s over” and I’m like “No, people will pay if it’s curated, if it’s a fan club and if it’s a concierge service in a way where you’re getting first look at a lot of cool stuff.” And so far it’s been successful.

Ed.: Ready to try it yourself? I have been for over a year on Ghostly’s catalog – and as a particular fan of a few Ghostly artists, it’s been something I’ve really loved using. Of course, having a label you want is key, but have a look below and let us know what you think. Still sticking to Spotify? iTunes? Beatport? Vinyl? The radio? Curious to know reader perspectives as artists and listeners. Thanks, Matt! -PK

http://drip.fm

Disappointed our electronic music present didn’t turn out the way it was supposed to when it was still the future? Sad you didn’t get shiny, knob-laden synths, robot masks, blindingly-colorful lens flares, funky-crisp electro jams, and beloved music distributed on cassette?

Well, you could sit around getting all wistful, or you could simply make that future happen.

Belgian synth collective Chrome Brulée chose action over nostalgia, constructing the universe seen in glossy Roland and Sequential ads from Keyboard Magazine, circa 1983. And the music video they’ve produced is just the teaser: stay tuned for music on, of course, cassette tape.

We’re treated to no small quantity of vintage pr0n – all looking, sorry, better and strangely more futuristic than most of the gear available on the market today. Maybe, in the hands of the right musicians, its time has simply come. Watch:

The whole thing is, of course, quite silly. It’s almost as though people are making music in order to enjoy themselves and have a good time. (Dangerous.) Micha Volders writes CDM:

I’m teaching Electronic Music together with Arne Van Petegem (styrofoam) here @ PHL Music University.

I recently started a synth collective called Chrome Brulée, with some graduated students as well as fellow musicians from Belgium. It’s a very oldskool/authentic project, without computers and a lot of interfacing with drum machines/cv/gate/clocks etc… and live playing of course…We’re releasing a Chrome Cassette Tape soon.

It’s a wonderful collective of artists: Robert Magnet, Ricky Sunset, Tony Johnson, Michael Shredlove, Alex Mayhem, Kid Supreme, and Club Cannibal. (Not to be confused with Kid Sundance from yesterday, but they’re in Holland, these kids are in Belgium … maybe we should all get together for chocolate and synthesizers. Mood elevator, that is.)

There’s also this great manifesto:

In a world where music has become irrelevant, in a time where quantity comes over quality…a new force rises from within…armed with magic machines of ancient times…driven by pure passion and devotion…..fueled by the craft and skills of their forefathers….they will fight to make music free again…they will rage until the spirits of old will have their revenge….they go by the name….Chrome Brulée

We’ll be watching for the tape to drop.

Give them some love on Facebook, because, well, you couldn’t have done that in the 80s:
https://www.facebook.com/ChromeBrulee

Saturn Never Sleeps, the band and label, released a new free compilation late last night to send love and thanks to DJ Kool Herc, the pioneering Jamaican-born DJ who gave birth to the hip-hop age in the West Bronx, New York City. I’m honored to have been part of the compilation along with a broad range of artists:

DaM-Funk, Damon Bennett, Dego, King Britt Presents Sylk 130, Ursula Rucker, Lushlife, ZIN, Hezekiah, Soul Litchfield, Illvibe Collective, Rucyl, Shigeto, Galapagoose (recently seen here on CDM sporting the monome software he co-created), Ras_G, Chuck Treece, Suzi Analogue, and Stef Eye

King Britt, the man at the helm of SNS, talks about his experience with Kool Herc aka Clive Campbell as he announces the release:
We Love DJ Kool Herc Compilation [Saturn Never Sleeps blog]

Whether any of this music resonates with you or not (and I do count on commenters to tell us precisely what they really think), the sheer diversity of music here is a tiny indication of just how profound DJ Kool Herc’s impact has been on music. This is just musicians doing what they do; with branches far from the original roots, it nonetheless shows the meaning of those roots to people making music of all kinds.

The impetus for this compilation – and many others in the music community – is an awareness of that tremendous debt, as well as the sobering reality of living in the US without health insurance. A lack of health insurance meant that Herc was recently unable to get needed health care when he faced illness, mounting bills, and surgery needed for kidney stones. I’m told he’s out of the woods for now, thanks to support he’s received (including assistance from Russell Simmons, though Saturn Never Sleeps is still welcoming donations via the site for the artist, his family, and the cause:
http://www.djkoolherc.com/

The issue with health insurance is larger than any one person. As his family writes on that site:

We also know that many of hip-hop’s pioneers and artists, like many Americans, have faced and will continue to face similar circumstances. So we call on the hip-hop community to come together to figure out positive solutions around health care and to advocate on behalf of the artists who made this culture and movement the global force for change that it is.

It’s an appropriate topic. In the impact of hip-hop on DJing, electronic music, and music culture, the political and musical have always gone hand in hand. At 1520 Sedgwick, where Kool Herc held his parties and developed techniques used globally by DJs today, hip-hop music culture was a form of resistance to a community ripped apart by NYC “master builder” Robert Moses’ Cross-Bronx Expressway.

From the local and personal grew musical forms that were expressive and universal.

Although the rhyming narration is a bit funky, it’s worth checking out this excerpt of a documentary on the early days of hip-hop, explaining just how DJ Kool Herc became known as its “father.”

The major technical innovation – the one that would go on to influence the likes of Grandmaster Flash – was what Herc first called the “merry-go-round,” the combination of breakbeats on top of one another to create a seamless mix. Saying that all DJing today owes some of its legacy to that breakthrough almost isn’t far-reaching enough; the resulting music transformed the way we hear rhythm, the emergence of remix musical culture, and aided the evolution of recorded music out of its EP- and LP-sized containers. (It certainly wasn’t the only breakthrough, but it began a parade of changes that form today’s mashable, digital musical culture.)

Saying that isn’t as useful as showing that, though. Here’s Kool Herc demonstrating the technique. It’s so commonplace now, it may be hard to imagine it ever having been unconventional.

Here’s a great interview from 1989 by Davey D, where – in musical time – the span of a handful of years had already made 1520 Sedgwick seem like ancient history. But the place of that landmark on the historical timeline of modern music has at least been recognized by the State of New York, the birthplace of hip-hop.

Interview w/ DJ Kool Herc: 1989 New Music Seminar by Davey D

That music has now become global, not just the product of its West Bronx origins. But as a New Yorker and an American and a musician, I hope we take that musical legacy and build for better times – build a city that is more caring to its residents, and a nation and planet that cares for its peoples’ health, across the board. I think there’s a reason the music and the parties sound optimistic: it’s optimism that those struggles aren’t in vain. Music can’t solve the nuanced problems of health care policy, and too often it fails to pay our bills. But it can give voice to that optimism.

tricil – The Emancipation from Clear Notice on Vimeo.

stretta – Calculus from Clear Notice on Vimeo.

Forget the iPad app or cross-media visual interpretation for a moment. “Enter Calico,” the compilation debut of new electronic label Clear Notice Recordings, begins with some damned fine music listening. In a world after shallow labels like “IDM,” this collection of independent artists represents the current generation about as well as any can. Meticulously-detailed sound designs stutter and shimmer through varied cinematic soundscapes, nodding at genres with only passing concern.

Like a well-curated variety show, something is bound to grab you somewhere.

But then, let’s talk about the videos. It’s nice to see a video album, though the quality there is a bit varied. (Several directors independently seemed to settle on the “guy wandering around looking bemused” theme, though not lacking for visual invention.)

But two videos are, quite simply, mind-blowingly good standouts, perhaps not coincidentally for two of the highlight tracks from the compilation. Videos for Tricil (John Jacobus) and stretta (Matthew Davidson) take their richly-sonorous music and place them in surreal new fantasies. The Franck Trebillac-directed “Calculus” for stretta and Franck Trebillac & Marc Broussely-directed “The Emancipation” for tricil each create, in digital video, curio boxes in which captured butterflies and dancers become frozen in time. It’s a bit creepy, beautifully delicate, and compelling.

It’s great to see these familiar artists alongside some new ones. If the label keeps up this level of quality, we’ve got some good times ahead.

You can listen to the full album streaming online – and really, without even one video or iPad app, this is enough to satisfy me.

Enter Calico by Clear Notice

1. Bandish Project – Track 3: Brown Skin Beauty Liquid Stranger Astral Abduction Remix (7:12) – CD: Brown Skin Beauty (Bheja Fry Records, 2010)

2. Bandish Project – Track 1: Brown Skin Beauty. Feat. Last Mango In Paris (3:46) – CD: Brown Skin Beauty (Bheja Fry Records, 2010)

3. Midival Punditz – Track 2: Tonic Piyush Bhatnagar Breaks Remix (7:12) – CD: Tonic Remixes (Six Degrees Records, 2010)

4. Midival Punditz – Track 3: Tonic Punditz Remix (5:21) – CD: Tonic Remixes (Six Degrees Records, 2010)

5. Sub Swara & Big Boi – Big Boi – Shutterbug (4:09) – Sub Swara Remix (2010)

6. Sub Swara – Track: 8 (pre-release): Steam (5:33) – CD: Triggers (11/2010)

7. Fusing Naked Beats – Track: 1: Treason (4:55) – CD: Crystal City (Just Play Records, 2010)

8. Fusing Naked Beats – pre-release: Assyria (4:31) – CD: Ubiquity (Just Play Records, 11/2010)

9. Siamgda – Track 6: Golden Prayer (7:32) – CD: Siamgda feat.Morty – Beach Tracks (Mind Plug Records, 2010)

10. Siamgda - Track 2: Ernakulam – Okha Express (7:07) – CD: Samsara (Mind Plug Records, 2010)

11. Engine-EarZ Experiment & DJ Luxy – Track 5: Scars – Basement Jaxx (4:38) – The Pyramids Mix (05/2010)

see all playlists here.
—

Lots of music hitting the inbox this week, from Reznor scoring a movie about Facebook to Ghostly giving away rarities.

Trent Reznor and bandmate Atticus Ross have scored The Social Network, and created a shadowy, throbbing musical landscape that I feel perfectly fits a biopic of geekdom’s dark underbelly. (The music mischievously asks, is it possible to be a bit seedy, lusty, and dorky at the same time?) They’ve also given away the first five tracks, and if you buy in the US on the 28th and 29th next week, you can get the whole thing for three bucks. Insert silly reference here to “hitting the Like button” or “friending something” like I keep hearing in the mainstream press every time this movie comes up. It’s totally going to be better than Pirates of Silicon Valley. (Okay, that goes without saying…)

Soundtrack: http://www.nullco.com/TSN/
News @ NIN

Our friends at Percussion Lab have been going absolutely nuts lately. It’s a Monday, so this evening NYC time, you can catch them on your Internets and live chat with them. But let’s first catch up with what they’ve been giving to us. Daedalus’ live set at the grungy, scene-y Santos Party House in TriBeCa is available for full download, a monome-powered, musical shot of energy drink. “I’ve been developing a little bit of a sweet tooth for tempo,” says Daedelus before launching into a frenetic live set.

Daedelus – Live from Santos Party Haus

If all that sugar gives you a head/toothache, here’s an alternative way to go at PercussionLab. It’s a scintillating, glowing assemblage of “beatless” (but pulsing and vibrating) sounds made for an art museum. Nicely assembled, and fantastic for chilling or coding.

Melodic Shapes by James Healy (Escape Art, Air Texture)
Sound Mix for Leo Villareal at the San Jose Museum of Art

Repeating sonic structures, creating melodic shapes, may form iconic pathways into abstract thought. Nice work by James Healy. It’s a perfect match for Leo Villareal’s visual work.
Tracklisting:

Loscil “Fern and Robin”, Antonio Trinchera “Just To See You Tomorrow”, bvdub “I Knew Happiness Once”, Mick Chillage “Hypothermia”, Antonio Trinchera “The Wind Make Himself”, Schwanbeck “Glow”, Aquadorsa “Daylight Fading Into Evening Silence”, Ulf Lohmann “Kristall”, Antonio Trinchera “Voce Falena”, Ulf Lohmann “My Pazifik”, John Barry “Out of Africa”, Klimek “for Michael Gira and Vladmir Ivanovich”, Loscil “Hyphae”

http://www.sjmusart.org/content/leo-villareal

Lastly, Burial and Kode9 assembled a set for the last BBC Radio 1 show hosted by Mary Anne Hobbs. (See that news, previously on CDM.)

Finally, some retrospectives from two titantic and well-loved electronic labels this month:

Ninja Tune turns 20, and also happen to be giving away an epic mix by founders Coldcut to anyone who registers for (or signs in) to their site.

I’m sure we’ll be seeing plenty of Ninja Tune coverage as they reach this landmark, but for eMusic users, legendary electronic music journalist Philip Sherburne chooses classics and essentials from their catalog. At eMusic prices, this could be a cheap way to round out your collection.

Starting this month, there are huge party events planned around the world.

And, of course, there’s the enormous, collectible Ninja Tune XX box set, as pictured above. You can hear samples on SoundCloud, below.

Heck, there’s even an iTunes app, though… well, to be honest, I don’t quite get it. It just plays tracks and tells you about releases, both of which your Web browser does just fine. Maybe I’m more old-fashioned than I thought; I’d rather sprawl out on the sofa with the box set and a pair of cans.

Ninja Tune XX Box Set Previews (CDs 1-4 only) by Ninja Tune XX

Not to be outdone, younger label Ghostly International has a free second volume of rarities which is hitting repeat in my player.

Highlights include Matthew Dear’s “Stab In The Backs”; Mobius Bands’ “You’re Wrong (Benoit Piouluard Remix)”; and Christopher Willits’ “Orange Lit Spaces (Electricwest Remix)”.

Those were some obvious choices; there’s more in my inbox and pile of things to hear, so watch for more, and keep it coming, music makers.

Hardly a day goes by, it seems, that someone isn’t talking about the death of the album, replaced by singles. When they say “album,” however, they tend to mean “pop album,” using as their primary metric sales of the very top end of the spectrum. In electronic music, the album has never been about sales. For one, singles have long ruled the dance floor, long before iTunes began peddling online downloads of a la carte tracks. But more than that, albums are a unit of time, a packaged statement of aesthetic thought. They’re a story. And after an explosion of flash-pot diversity, labels today begin to be valued for their longevity and endurance. Albums once justified the label. Now, labels are a reason for albums to exist.

Of course, actually figuring out how to do that is as challenging – in business and cuisine – as running a restaurant. You need enough diversity to keep people coming back, but without becoming chaotic or losing the plot. You need a quantity / quality list.

Ghostly International is to me one of the superstar musical chefs that’s done it right. This summer, they’ve reached the milestone of 100 album releases. That may sound like a lot, but Ghostly has had just over a decade in operation, meaning they’re averaging just around ten releases a year.

I’m not personally shelling out for one of the 50 in this series, but I really admire its design. It embodies Ghostly’s philosophy – and it’s also a symbolic milestone. With its beautiful, organic design, it’s a physical manifestation of the new, enduring album, the album that survives even in the age of torrent sites and iTunes singles and enormous hard drives and music as commodity. As Ghostly puts it:

The Ghostly Bento was inspired by Japan and its tradition of quality, service, and design—values that Ghostly has always cherished. “Manzoku” is a Japanese word that roughly translates to “satisfaction.” Thus, the Bento is an intimate celebration of satisfaction in multiple forms—tactile, visual, aural—packaged in a handcrafted wooden box, stained and etched with a stunning image by LA artist Dosa Kim.

Putting out pretty wooden boxes isn’t going to justify any label, but Ghostly is busy, as always, this month.

Here in New York at digital tech research hub Eyebeam, a handful of artists will gather to collaborate with the label on visualization of music, under the tutelage of digital artists Aaron Myers and Aaron Koblin, as covered previously on CDMotion:
Matching Visuals to Music: Round-up of Inspiration
I hope to be there covering what happens, and coding myself.

This Friday July 9 in San Francisco and Saturday July 10 in Los Angeles, Ghostly will celebrate its 100 discs with live events, featuring favored artists like Tycho, Shigeto, The Sight Below, and Mux Mool. (If anyone from CDM’s readership would like to go cover, we’d be much obliged!)
XLR8R.com, SF event, LA showcase

And if you want to include records other than just Ghostly’s in your listening queue, check out their lovely look back at the past decade at the end of last year – plenty of agreement in my own music library here.
Ghostly’s 110: Our Favorite Albums of the Decade

Meanwhile, if you want a look behind the scenes with a Ghostly artist, here’s what Christopher Willits is up to with Livid Instruments’ Block (see last week’s round-up) and Ableton Live with Max for Live, for our friends at XLR8R.

The Internet is supposedly about quantity over quality – endless releases of every sound a computer can spit out, limitless choice and access, albums as prolific and disposable as Twitter updates. Of course, whether it actually is that or not is, as always, up to the creators.

Netlabel Feedback Loop, based in Lisboa, Portugal, has some self-imposed discipline. They release only three or four editions a year, with tracks carefully curated to represent only the best. The initial EP is free, released in high-definition audio if desired; if successful, a paid full-length is the follow-up.

The latest release is an ideal selection for focusing your thoughts and musical energies on this Monday. “Kuss” is a selection of six exceptional tracks from the Guildford, Surrey (UK)-based artist Ambienteer. (I’ll let you guess his musical genre of choice.) The cuts off the EP are to me a perfect balance of organic and synthetic sound, always imbued with a sense of intention and change; there’s never the static quality ambient releases sometimes have. Gorgeous sound design combine with thoughtful, meditative composition. And that’s all I’ll say about it, because you should really just listen – in 320k MP3, FLAC, and other formats. (Bless you, Bandcamp. We deserve you, after all that suffering with MyS****.)

Download, plus more info from curator Leonardo Rosado:
http://feedbacklooplabel.bandcamp.com/album/kuss

And for other releases from the netlabel:
http://feedbacklooplabel.blogspot.com/

A side note: this comes to us by way of our friends at another exceptionally-fine netlabel, PublicSpacesLab. (Previously on CDM) I’m saddened to learn that the co-founder of that label, Alejandro Mendez, passed away last month. Condolences to his friends, family, and his colleagues at the label.

RIP Alejandro Mendez

This post, by definition, overlaps with the worlds of Create Digital Music and Create Digital Motion, so I’m cross-posting — absolutely not one you want to miss, both because of the event in New York, and because the landscape of works here engages issues about which readers here I know are passionate. Music and visuals are each themselves endless wells of potential; put them together, and “infinite possibility” probably isn’t an overstatement. This July, label Ghostly International is working with researchers at New York’s Eyebeam research center to do a free, one-week intensive on dynamically-generated visuals for sound. Before you read on, that deadline is the end of today NYC time, via a fairly simple online application form. Check out the full details and application form. The event is led by artists Aaron Meyers (Flying Lotus’ Fieldlines) and Aaron Koblin (Daisy Bell). I asked Mr. Meyers for a round-up of the kind of work that he’s done… Read the full story on Create Digital Motion

If anyone had listened to the predictions, albums would be irrelevant by now. Instead, finding a way to weave music into a coherent narrative of tracks, and imbuing the object with meaning and value, matters more than ever. Finding time and resources is as much a challenge as ever, but there are some new tools for funding and finding music, even in the age of exploding global population and output. Auditory Canvas’ record “Fabric of Life” is one of the many gems out there to discover. It’s a sparkling, delicate dreamscape of music, noted by our friend stretta (known for his own lovely music in the monome community). I’m not as fond of the final cuts on the album, personally; the spoken political narrative for me isn’t nearly as evocative as the opening numbers. (It’s nonetheless nice to hear music injected with such a point of view.) But there is a strong sense that creator David of Summer Rain Recordings is traversing a varied and personal musical terrain. It’s the kind of music that could bring you some spring inspiration. Just as significant, Auditory Canvas made the album possible by crowdsourcing “kickstarter” funding at kickstarter.com. And lest such projects become selfish, by purchasing the album, you generate revenue to go back into the kickstarter system. Album production, after all, is far cheaper than it once was, but it isn’t free. “Fabric of Life” demonstrates what could happen to musical ecology if this kind of micro-lending invested in good, new work. And your purchase becomes a way to turn David into an investor himself in the system, keeping the cycle going. To make that purchase worthwhile, Auditory Canvas put some thought into the lovely presentation; the limited edition has an almost theatrical approach to packaging, and even comes with a papercraft KORG synth (which I can add to my paper Minimoog from GAS). David writes with a number of talking points:

• Funded via a kickstarter project ( http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/auditorycanvas/be-a-part-of-the-fabric-of-life-album-release-0)
• $1000 from sales going back into other people’s kickstarter projects.
• 10% of sales going to charity (NextAid.org)
• CD packaging produced using recycled plastic, recycled paper, and soy inks
• Released on my own label, Summer Rain Recordings (all artists donate a portion of their royalties to charity, the label matches their donation)
• Limited edition and standard CD and digital available here: http://auditorycanvas.net/store
• Available on all digital retailers 17 May
• More info at: http://auditorycanvas.net or http://summerrainrecordings.net

The interesting thing about the release strategy is, while it does make the album available through digital channels, it provides some big incentives to go straight to the artist. And that kind of self-motivated album release may increasingly become essential. For a stunning visualization of why, look no further than the lovely blog Information is Beautiful. Using data and analysis from The Cynical Musician, it paints a sobering portrait of the harsh realities of digital distribution. Artists would have to get 1.5+ million plays on Last.fm’s streaming service just to make a month’s living wage. It’s certainly a glass half-empty / half-full situation, though: you’d only need to sell 143 self-pressed CDs. And that should be optimistic: online tools, even those that sell music, are great promotional tools; boutique sales of physical objects (or even of downloads, in situations where the artist gets a bigger cut) are where the revenue is. And even if that doesn’t help you quit your day job, that could be essential in being able to invest in your next record and keep artists productive. (This is also, it seems to me, a great argument for the potential value of torrents and Creative Commons licensing. If the online file is a promotional tool, best to get it far and try to leverage the things that do bring in money than try to get a few extra nickels and dimes.) It also pretty clearly makes the challenges facing the business of music about format and economies of scale, not piracy (or, at the very least, not piracy alone – not by a long shot, if the “legal” services aren’t generating measurable revenue, either). HOW MUCH DO MUSIC ARTISTS EARN ONLINE? Thanks to David for sharing his lovely music. And I expect, whether you’re a great fan of the album or not, this should get some wheels turning about that album you’ve been trying to finish.

Our good friends the SECRET ARCHIVES OF THE VATICAN return with a golden EP called “Glidepath” which is full of really coool Transnational Arabic and Indian Dubstep and Breakbeat flava’s AND it’s available for free!!!

I’ve got to say I think it’s some of their best work to date!  The title track is probably the stand out for me, full of Middle Eastern beauty but the whole EP is full of great tracks!

Tracklist is as above!

=> Grab it here !! Freedownload !! (click on it)

The tunes are 320kbps mp3s…..if any of you would like them in a different format, let the boyz know and they’ll arrange it!

• Secret Archives of the Vatican – Secret Archive by Vince Millett
• Secret Archives of the Vatican – Kung Fu Magic by Vince Millett
• Secret Archives of the Vatican – Gold and Slaves by Vince Millett
• Secret Archives of the Vatican – Foundation and Empire by Vince Millett

.
(Source: 2nd May 2010 – Generation Bass)

London based producer and solo artist Gaudi’s latest album No Prisoners ((Six Degrees Records) comes to us from a very productive year in which Gaudi toured the world, rocking dance floors and gathering fans with his unconventional innovative performance style and dance-floor filling tunes. It was also a year in which he was nominated for a BBC World Music Award for his Six Degrees release Dub Qawwali (with legendary Sufi singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan) – see press release. The album’s success extended Gaudi’s fan base substantially, particularly in America and Canada, reaching #2 in the iTunes World Chart (USA) and #1 on Amazon.com’s Electronica charts.

It was also a year in which Gaudi took an unusual posting in Italy and became the ‘representative of the underground’ in the role of Vocal Coach and Mentor for the groups category in the hit TV talent show X Factor. During 3 series he produced an overall show winner, the winners of the critics award and also received a gold disc following the success of one of the groups debut album that he produced.

In all his albums Gaudi has worked to create his own synthesis using elements of dub, electronica and world music which has been mostly down-tempo in nature… No Prisoners is a very different and definitely up-tempo creation. Stylistically its primary energy is breakbeat influences underpinned with fat basslines and subtle live world instrumentation such as oud, tribal percussion and highland bagpipes. The performances of many fine musicians on the album bring a human touch; with live bass and guitars, percussion, drum, melodica and piano amongst others, while the electronic elements, as per all Gaudi’s albums, come from his beloved analogue equipment – vintage synthesizers, tape echoes and spring reverbs. The result gives No Prisoners the warmth and authenticity of sound which has become synonymous with Gaudi’s music.

A highly respected line-up of featured guests add their international appeal and individual flavors to the album, amongst them; California’s conscious political lyricist and founder of Spearhead Michael Franti, who lends his emotive tones to “There’s Enough” and long established Brooklyn based reggae artist Dr Israel (of Easy Star All Stars “Dub side of the moon” fame) who features on “No Time”; Multi-million selling Italian singer-songwriter Elisa gives a feminine edge to “Brainwashed Again” and Jamaican Reggae vocalist Kenny Knots goes deep with the ecclesiastical “Strictly Goodness”. Other notable guests include pioneering down-tempo dub producer Dub Gabriel on “Barracudub”; UK Breakbeat duo Far Too Loud and emerging electro-breaks producer Tom Real; who contribute to “No more blood” and “Bad Boy Bass” respectively.

No Prisoners as the title suggests, is an album made without concessions, each track uncompromising in the delivery of its sonic payload. It is a fresh and versatile album with the potential to become an original classic.

© Wordsmith, 2010

Tracklist:

1) Bad Boy Bass 4.54
2) There’s Enough (feat. Michael Franti and Hardage) 4.41
3) Serious Ting 5.10
4) Back To Baia 4.46
5) Oud We Think We Are? 5.10
6) No Time (feat. Dr.Israel) 5.01
7) Barracudub 4.17
8) Hotel Caledonia 5.48
9) Strictly Goodness (feat. Kenny Knots) 5.53
10) Brainwashed Again (feat. Elisa and Danny Ladwa) 4.16
11) No More Blood 6.19
12) Space Phenomena 6.38

Order “No Prisoners” @ Amazon: 14.99 US$ instead 16.98 Us$ (prize of 24th May 2010)

Musicians involved in the making of No Prisoners:

• Michael Franti – voice on “There’s Enough”
• Dr Israel – voice on “No Time”
• Danny Ladwa – voice on “Brainwashed Again”
• Elisa – voice on “Brainwashed Again”
• Kenny Knots – voice on “Strictly Goodness”
• Conroy Ellis – voice on “Bad Boy Bass”
• Bunny Wailer – voice on “Serious Ting”
• Alex  Goodwill – backing vocals on “There’s Enough”
• Tom Thorley – backing vocals on “There’s Enough”
• Jeff Stott – oud on “Oud We Think We Are”
• Alessandro Magri – piano on “There’s Enough”
• Lorne Cousin – bagpipe on “Hotel Caledonia’”
• Ashtech – bass on “Oud We Think We Are”
• Omer Marantz – bass and guitar on “Back To Baia”
• Roberta Vicinelli – bass on “There’s Enough”
• Dor Kelman – percussion on “Serious Ting”
• Zozo Kombe – percussion on “Oud We Think We Are”
• Oddur Runarsson – guitar on “No More Blood”
• Yair Schleider – guitar on “No Time”
• Liquid stranger – synthesizer on “Hotel Caledonia”
• Dub Gabriel – co-programming on “Barracudub”
• Far too loud – co-programming on “No More Blood”
• Tom Real – co-programming on “Bad Boy Bass”
• Gaudi – all instruments + programming on all tracks

Produced and arranged by Gaudi ( Recorded @ Metatron Studio & Mastered by David Blackman @ Hiltongrove Studio, London).

(Source: 03/2010 – Gaudi – www.gaudimusic.com)

By Shabnam Mahmood ( BBC Asian Network )

BBC Asian Network is to launch the first ever official UK download chart for Asian music.

The Official Charts Company (OCC), which publishes the mainstream UK top 40, will also compile the new chart.

The OCC will use UK sales data provided from a panel of more than 30 digital retail stores, including iTunes, Amazon and Napster.

An Asian top 20 countdown show hosted by Bobby Friction will start on the Asian Network from Saturday, 27 March.

BBC Asian Network’s head of music, Mark Strippel, said: “We have long recognised that establishing an industry recognised official chart format is an important building block in the infrastructure of British Asian music.”

Music of British Asian or South Asian, including Indian, Pakistani, Bangladeshi and Sri Lankan, origin will make up the chart and a full top 40 will be published online.

The OCC says downloads now account for 98% of all single sales.

It compiled the UK’s first official singles download chart on 1 September, 2004 and, with a rise in British Asian music being purchased online rather than in traditional Asian record stores, will now do the same with Asian music.

Billy Grant from the Association of Independent Music, said the new chart would “undoubtedly create more exposure” for Asian artists.

DJ Bobby Friction said: “Having an official chart is going to make a massive difference to Asian artists in the UK because, until now, they’ve not really understood where they stand in the grand scheme of things.

“They’ve had record shops and labels telling them of good sales but they’ve not been able to quantify them.”

(Source: 02/2010 – BBC NEWS – BBC Asian Network)