Off - Record label: April 2011

Saturday, 9 April 2011

OCD014/OUW000 : Josse De Pauw - Peter Vermeersch - Pierre Vervloesem / Weg

Josse De Pauw tells in Weg about the life of a man, his youth, his exercises in leaving. Intimate childhood memories are inimitably combined with cosmic reflections about life and saying goodbye.

Peter Vermeersch and Pierre Vervloesem provide all this with an impressive soundtrack that varies from jazz to ambient, from musette and chachacha to Petula Clark.

"In Weg, text and music are unique in a unique way. It is rare that such a beautiful symbiosis arises. An intimate show full of humor, generous and terribly delicious "(Radio 1)

"Josse De Pauw tells as only the big ones can" (De Morgen)

Selected for the 1999 Theater Festival

Josse De Pauw vertelt in Weg flarden over het leven van een man, zijn jeugd, zijn oefeningen in weggaan. Intieme jeugdherinneringen worden op onnavolgbare wijze gecombineerd met kosmische bespiegelingen over leven en afscheid nemen. Peter Vermeersch en Pierre Vervloesem voorzien dit alles van een indrukwekkende soundtrack die varieert van jazz tot ambient, van musette en chachacha tot Petula Clark.

“In Weg zijn tekst en muziek op unieke manier één. Het is zeldzaam dat er zo’n mooie symbiose ontstaat. Een intieme voorstelling vol humor, genereus en verschrikkelijk verrukkelijk” (Radio 1)

“Josse De Pauw vertelt zoals alleen de groten dat kunnen” (De Morgen)

Geselecteerd voor het Theaterfestival 1999

Digital and physical release on the 1st of March 2011.

Track listing:

1: GoDJes
2: Josken
3: Elf Kinderen / Veel Lawaai
4: Zee
5: Yes Body N°5
6: Los Van Alles
7: En Ze Zingt
8: Crash!
9: Held
10: Sven, Björn En Aïsha
11: Stuske Stront
12: Zand
13: La Nuit

And in Bandcamp:

OCD013-OUI022 : Jesse Elder / The Winding Shell

jesse Elder is a four time ASCAP award winning jazz composer and pianist based in New York City.

He has performed at the Blue Note, the Jazz Standard, Small's, Fat Cat, the Stone, Town Hall, BargeMusic, Minton's Playhouse, Top of the Rock, and other prestigious venues. He currently performs 7 gigs per week in Manhattan and Brooklyn.

"The Winding Shell" is his debut CD.

Logan Richardson (alto saxophone) has performed in major jazz festivals and venues all over the world.

He has released two albums as a leader. He has shared the bandstand with artists such as Jason Moran, Nasheet Waits, Stefon Harris, Joe Chambers, Jeff “tain” Watts, Mark Turner, Mulgrew Miller and Ralph Alessi to name a few.

www.loganrichardson.com

Gary Thomas (tenor saxophone) is a musical legend. He has played amongst the very best including Miles Davis, Jack DeJohnette, Herbie Hancock, John McLaughlin, John Scofield, Sam Rivers, Pat Metheny, and countless others. For the last ten years, he has been the Director and Chair of Jazz Studies at The Peabody Institute in Baltimore, MD.

Chris Cheek (tenor saxophone) has performed around the world with artists such as Paul Motian, Charlie Haden,

Brian Blade, Luciana Souza, and many others. He has appeared as a sideman on over sixty records and has released four of his own. His most recent CD, "Blues Cruise", features Brad Mehldau.

www.chrischeek.net

Jeremy Viner (tenor saxophone) is currently in graduate school at Julliard. He has performed with some of the leading ensembles in New York City, including the Steve Lehman Octet, the John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, and others. He has performed on Saturday Night Live, the David Letterman Show, Jay Lenno and NPR's "From the Top". www.jeremyviner.com

Chris Tordini (acoustic bass) has become one of the most in-demand bassists in the New York City jazz and creative music scene.

He has performed throughout the world with artists/bands such as Ari Hoenig, Jean-Michel Pilc, Dapp Theory, Logan

Richardson, Jim Black, MK Groove Orchestra, and many others.

Tyshawn Sorey (drums) is a composer and performer. He has worked with a diverse array of musicians, including

Muhal Richard Abrams, Ray Anderson, Wadada Leo Smith, Steve Coleman, Peter Evans, John Zorn, Mario Pavone, Ellery Eskelin, Dave Douglas, Mark Helias and Butch Morris, among many others. Sorey‘s work has been favorably reviewed in The Village Voice, The Wire, The New York Times and Downbeat Magazine.

A native of Japan, Aya Nishina (piano) is a composer of acoustic and electroacoustic vocal music. Aya's compositions have been commissioned and performed worldwide. As a composer and improviser she has worked with artists including John Zorn, Greg Osby, Cyro Baptista, Ned Rothenberg and Lukas Ligeti. Signed to John Zorn's record label Tzadik, Aya is currently in the process of making her first album.

Postlude I/II/III/IV - Four Hand Piano Improvisation by Jesse Elder & Aya Nishina.

Jesse Elder: Piano

Logan Richardson: Alto Sax

Gary Thomas: Tenor sax

Chris Cheek: Tenor sax

Jeremy Viner: Tenor sax

Chris Tordini: Double bass

Tyshawn Sorey: Drums

Aya Nishina: Piano

Track listing:

1 : Surrender

2 : Solar Plexus

3 : The thoughtful Nudge

4 : Flight of the Pelican

5 : Rotating Canvases

6 : Kiss Rain

7 : Red Paint

8 : The Winding Shell

9 : All Moments

Itunes, Spotify, etc.:

https://bfan.link/the-winding-shell

And on Bandcamp:

OCD012 : Mai Lev / Birthday

OCD012 : Mai Lev / Birthday

From the world of opera and pop-rock comes Israëlian singer-songwriter Mai Lev, with an angelic voice and a keen heart.

She grew up in a musical family listening mainly to Debussy , Ravel , Björk , the Beatles , Bach , Philip Glass , Britten , the Doors , Nirvana , Frank Sinatra, Kate Bush , Depeche Mode and Pink Floyd.

It took her two years in the making of her first solo album as she started with a voice and a piano and finished with a 25 members classical orchestra.

While she wrote and composed all the songs, she let Nir Maimon, a bass player and talented producer, do all the arrangements of the album. Listening to her songs give the feeling of Mai’ instinct for the perfect and beautifully builded melodies. It takes only once to keep her music and her voice going in your head for quite a long time, but then you irresistibly need to listen to the album again until it draws you in completely.

This album is a come back to the musical roots of her childhood - classical music with rock , pop and electronic flavors.

One could compare Mai’ travel in music to the like of Björk, as she has been singing, playing and composing music since early childhood .

By the time she was 14 she was leading a punk band, performing her music in clubs all over the Galilee.

Later she turned to performing classical music, and making electronic music with "The Sweep"

Their album "Voicemail" came out on 2006 on Hataklit records in Israel .

Van Dyke Parks, most well known for his arrangements for the Beach Boys, The Birds, Loudon Wainwright III and Joanna Newsom, became a fan. They intended to perform together in 2010, but unfortunately, this never materialized.

Track listing :

1 : MR Wrong

2 : Give

3 : Birthday

4 : To me

5 : Better

6 : Imaginary friend

7 : Ready for love

8 : Women

9 : Die

10 : Broken

11 : Girlie blue

And in Bandcamp:

OPR002 : Mai Lev / Mai Lev

OPR002 : Mai Lev / Mai Lev

3 tracks promo single

Track listing:
1. Better
2. Mr.Wrong
3.Give

OCD011 : SLuG / SLuG

" Where so many bands try to copy the sound of Portishead as if it consisted only of technical gimmicks, this trio succeed to make their own the spirit and the soul of this psychedelic and dark music. This is ambitious and bewitched music ! Hopefully Tim Burton will get to hear it ! » ( in Les Inrockuptibles – leading French music magazine/ September 2008).

Emmanuel BORGHI started his career in the mid 80 ies. From 1987 to 2008, he played with the cult composer and drummer Christian Vander in Magma. At the same time, he performed with a lot of musicians from the Jazz scene like Steve Grossman, Sunny Murray, , Sonny Simons, and many others. In 1996, he moved to Macon to be part of the Collectif Mü and also started another electric project called One Shot. In 2001, he joined NHX, a experimental electro-jazz band.Today, he is dividing his time between those various projects and his brand new one : SLuG.

Himiko Paganotti Started to sing with the band Touré touré from Senegal in 1995. From there she worked with different artists like Ousmane Touré kunda, Sixtun, Rido Bayonne, Patrick Gautier, Serah, Régis Ceccarelli, 13NRV, Juan Rozoff, Coco m’Bassi and Nicoletta ! From 2001 to 2008, she became part of the band Magma.

In 2004, she started Paghistree with Emmanuel Borghi where some of the songs became the base for the SLuG project.

Their encounter with Thomas Lucas, aka John Trap for his solo project, gave birth to SLuG.

One can depict SLuG’s music as a mix between Folk-rock and Electro- Pop. A mixture that could remind a modern Kate Bush at times who could have joint Eels or John Williams !

Band Members:

Himiko Paganotti : vocals / Emmanuel Borghi : piano and keyboards / John Trap (solo) : folk guitar and Sampler / Antoine Paganotti : drums / Gabriel Dilasser : bass.

Track listing :

1 : The voice behind the screen

2 : I cannot sleep in my room

3 : My dear hunter

4 : Shelter

5 : Sad Beat

6 : Dead Trees

7 : I can share this space

8 : Speed and joy

9 : New day

10: Grey

11: Like a friend

A beautiful video of the last concert of SLuG. Fantastic new renditions of some tracks of their eponymous album released on Off ( OCD011 SLuG ) and some new songs from their new album!
With the great Bernard Paganotti on Bass!

SLuG - Live au Café de la Danse (extrait) - 19... par manuborghi

OPR001 : SLuG / Speed and Joy

OPR001 : SLuG / Speed and Joy

Promo EP with two titles + two remixes ( one from Tepr!)

Track listing:

1. Speed and Joy
2. The voice beyond the screen
3. Speed and Joy - John Trap ( solo) remix
4. The voice beyond the screen - Tepr remix

OCD010 : Comfort / Sleep Talking Shared

Alessandro Baris, Leonardo Chirulli and Fabio Elia starter the band Comfort in 2000 in Pisa, Italy.

They released their first record “ Eclipse” in 2006 on Psychotica record.

While recording the tracks for this new album ‘Sleep Talking Shared” , they also collaborated with Pulseprogramming, Mauro Orselli, Roberto Bellatalla, Costa Music, Vonneumann and Caboto.

Their influences range from a lot of different musics, from Jazz to classical to soundtracks.

Radian, Fred Frith , Four Tet, The Cinematic Orchestra, Mr Bungle, Ornette Colemann, Arnold Schoenberg, Robert Schumann, Ennio Morricone, Tortoise, Naked City are bands and musicians they speak a lot about.

And those are definitively roots you can recognise here and there in this new album.

They manage to give us a music full of lights even though, at times, electronics and percussions sound dark and mysterious.

A modern soundtrack for a modern Fellini movie !

Band members :

Alessandro Baris : Guitars /Keys / Electronics / Drums

Leonardo Chirulli : Keys

Fabio Elia : Bass

Track listing :

1 : Shape

2 : Where the walk is slow

3 : The missed Environment

4 : Florian

5 : Iceberg

6 : Concreto e Indefinito

7 : Stammering Valves

8 : Contemporary Nocturne

9 : Organic Deca-Dance

10 : He moves his head back

OCD009 : Colorlist / Photographs

Cover art by Kiekebiche

OCD009 : Colorlist / Photographs

Colorlist is the creation of just two of the most prolific musicians from the Chicago new jazz scene : Charles Rumback on drums and Charles Gorzcynski on sax.

The purpose is to improvise, add texture and arrive to a very intuitive and meditative music, soft-toned, organic and patient, composed with accessible melodies in mind, and searching while rarely scathing. But it’s concurrently fractured, fried and strung into compositions nearly unidentifiable from their original sources.

This new album is a reconstructed version by a myriad of underground producers worldwide of the LISTS album (ODG005, here) released in February 2008.

Band members : Charles Rumback: bio
Charles Gorzcynski: bio
Brian Bullard: bio
Matthew Gagnon

Remixers:

1 : 3+ (Masami Shiraishi, from Japan, website).

2 : Reminder (Joshua Abrams, bio, bassist for Sam Prekop, Savath & Savalas, Prefuse 73, Nicole Mitchell, Loose Assembly, Sticks and Stones, Jeff Parker…).

3 : Phantom Crew of Intelligent Robots (Anthony Abbinanti, drummer for Chicago-based Dub Reggae greats, The Drastics, discography, website).

4: Slava is a Chicago based musician (website).

5: The Mercury Effect (Tommy Faulds, the other half of Silences Sumire).

6: Reaction (Brian Bullard, recording engineer working with many great artists in Chicago and also a working studio member of Colorlist).

7: Fred Lonberg-Holm (bio, played with everyone from Telefon Tel Aviv, Tony Malaby, Costa Music, L'Altra, Wilco, Janet Bean, Freakwater, Archer Prewitt, DRMWPN…).

8: Halflife (Chris Merrill, bassist for The Drastics).

9: Gamial Trio (Gabriel Sévérin, Michel Duyck, Alinovsky, from Belgium, all playing in lot’s of different projects, like Babils, Silksaw, Rob(u)rang…).

Track listing :

. 1. These Complimentary (Remix)

2. Pteridophyta

3. Lungs, Arms and Shoulders

4. Sundrenched Clearing

5. Walking Distance

6. Csapas

7. Orchid (Thin Skin Mix)

8. Musgo Vivo

9. City Life (Remix)

OCD008 : Robert Edwin / Messy Waves

Robert Edwin was born in Shizuoka, Japan at the end of 1973, and still lives there.

He started piano lessons at the age of 5 but stopped playing at 9.

However the exposure and training that he received during this time grew inside his mind until the age of 17, when he bought his first electric guitar. Inspired by the artists seen on MTV rather than the music that was being enjoyed locally, Robert began to develop the keen and unique musical vision that was soon to be his.

When one hears a Robert Edwin song, he does not know how to react as his music explodes to the mind !

Robert’s music could be depicted as a mixture of heavy guitars meet crazy rhythmes meet hip-hop meets Yellow Magic Orchestra meets Japanese pop from the 80ties meets Godzilla !

He believes it’s just noises while most people believe it’s pure fun and energy !

It is definitively a music that brings you a big smile for the rest of the day !

Composing members:

Robert Edwin : keys, guitars, vocals and production

With some guest appearances by :

Miurn / Phonetiks / Brankal / Deft Aphid / Ajlovett / 444 and Kam Stick

Track listing :

1. Tech nock 3

2. My World

3. Love is Peace

4. Pink disk chick

5. From Moomin valley

6. Spot on

7. Space Tamachans

8. One

9. Teisei

10. Oh pai

11. Hatsukura ni Hatsukura

12. Shake on it

13. Myspace addiction

14. Out of Body Experience

Album Review

"Confusing" and "frantic" are not generally adjectives that figure prominently in a positive review, but they're attributes that work well to describe the really pretty engaging music of Japanese producer, composer, and multi-instrumentalist Robert Edwin. This is his first full-length release, and you can tell it's the work of a singles artist: stylistically it's all over the map, the common feature that binds the tracks together being a sort of all-purpose sonic adventurousness that leads him equally willingly into house, punk, hip-hop, prog rock, and avant pop territories. Not everything is brilliant, but the high points are seriously impressive: the claustrophobic "From Moomin Valley," which sounds like a collaboration between John Zorn and Birdsongs of the Mesozoic; the startlingly tuneful and fun "My World"; the hip-hoppy "One" and "Tisei"; the frenetic "Shake on It." The less successful moments vary in quality from slightly tedious ("Out of Body Experience") to rather wanky and self-indulgent (the unforgivably proggy "Spot On"), but even when he fails he generally does so in ways that are genuinely interesting to hear.

Les amateurs de télescopages musicaux notoires devraient apprécier ce Messy
Waves où perlent gouttes de sueur trance/dub ("Pink disc chick"), électronica
foutraque ("Love is peace"), pop expérimentale ("My world"), hip-hop ("One"),
néo-jazz rock ("Myspace addiction", "Shake on it"), et pas mal d’ovnis plus ou
moins chantés/parlés en arrière-fond, comme ce "Hatsukura ni hastsukura",
détournement probable d’un hymne pop/métal nippon. Auteur de ce forfait, le
japonais Robert Edwin parvient à distiller sa musique à partir d’un bric-à-brac de
sons et d’influences, et aussi d’un certain sens des arrangements, souvent assez
soigné (le monsieur serait-il un fan qui s’ignore du Yellow Magic Orchestra et de
Cornelius). Inutile de dire que ça part dans tous les sens, à tel point que s’il
décidait de mettre un peu de breakcore dans son panier, on verrait bien les sbires
de labels comme Daly City se lancer sur ses trousses.

Laurent Catala

OCD007 : Strings of Consciousness / Fantomastique Acoustica

Cover art by Kiekebiche

OCD007 : Strings of Consciousness / Fantomastique Acoustica

Strings Of Consciousness has united acoustic music and digital technology. Their sound is meant and dreamt to be adventurous and creative.

Throughout the past few years they have noticed that more and more experimentalists were expressing less and less concern for their potential listeners, forgetting to respect some structures/directions in their composition and most of all lacking humanity.

Even if they sculpt and craft their music with a lot of focus on detail and days and days of editing, the most important is to convey emotions, feelings.

Today, 14 musicians form the collective though the heart of Strings Of Consciousness is a string quartet, as its name makes clear, but it is also a direct literary reference to the "stream of consciousness", a term that was earlier in the 20th century to illustrate the flow of words echoing the narrator's thoughts. A narrative technique which is dear to the ensemble because of musical freeforms they all feel strongly about. Though they do not believe that free playing equals everyone playing at once. Grace and space are of the utmost importance.

Their first album was released on Barry Adamson’s Central Control label in 2007.

Their new album ‘Fantomastique Acoustica’ sees four new tracks and a stream of remixes by the best musicians of the moment. Two videos are also on this new album.

Composing members:

Hervé Vincenti (guitars/samplers/keys)

Perceval Bellone (saxophone/piano/harmonium/tibetan bowls)

Philippe Petit (laptop/turntables): http://www.discogs.com/artist/Philippe+Petit

Track listing :

Strings of Conciousness :

1 : Mossgarden

2 : Forest os Spades

3 : Fantomastique Alaska

4 : Crest & Watersheds

Remixes by :

5 : Rothko

6 : Mira Calix

7 : Kammerflimmer Kollektief

8 : Gamial Trio

9 : Leafcutter John

10 : Scanner

11 : Marsen Jules

12 : Sutekh

13 : Si-cut.db

+ 2 videos : Asphodel and Scanner Seville Fade

On Bandcamp:

OCD006 : El Topo / Pigiama Psicoattivo

Cover art by Kiekebiche

OCD006 : El Topo / Pigiama Psicoattivo

The group was founded in 2006, performing a mixture of rockjazz and electronica, with krautrock, minimalist and psychedelic elements.
Adriano Lanzi and Omar Sodano had been working together since year 2000, releasing some tracks on compilation albums and a full album (La Vita Perfetta, 2004) on the German Klangbad label.

After some live gigs as a duo, they felt the need to set a larger band up. After a series of one-off collaborations, they found like-minded conspirators in Francesco Mendolia, drummer with the ability to perform in a wide range of styles from jazz/funk to electronic music (Chester Harlan, Alessandro Gwiss, Mino Freda) and Andrea Biondi, vibist and percussionist active in jazz and contemporary music (Gianluigi Trovesi, Ennio Morricone & Roma Sinfonietta, Ars Ludi).

The group is often joined on stage by Neumax, a team of visual artists (Simone Palma, Mirko Bruner, Alessandro Quintino) operating in mixed media (theatre, video, photography, net-art, vj-set) in a real-time interaction of images and sounds.

New album "Pigiama Psicoattivo", was recorded with the friendly contributions by such guest musicians as Amy Denio, Mike Cooper, Riccardo Lay and Anadi Mishra.

Band member:

ADRIANO LANZI: guitar, electronics.

OMAR SODANO: bass, electronics.

ANDREA BIONDI: vibes, percussion.
FRANCESCO MENDOLIA: drums.

Track listing :

1 : Tosca

2 : Sonics

3 : Seicento Giri Carico Frontale

4 : Pigiama Psicoattivo

5 : Telegraph Dakar

6 : Scelsi

7 : Errore Meccanico

8 : Crew’N’C

9 : Macinino