This is just jaw-dropping. If I tell you it’s kind of violin-based electro-acoustic, you may think you know what to expect, but I don’t think you do. This record is packed with astonishing sounds: it wails, it thrums, it pulses, it soars, it laments, it floats. Oh, and there are some heartstring-tugging melodies, too. Elbo’s […]
Tag: label_sonic_pieces
Previously, on “dogrando writes about some records”… Eight (8!!!) years ago, Deaf Center’s Owl Splinters was a pretty big deal in these parts. It had some fine examples of the kind of close-miked solo piano sound that was very popular back then, and some excellently spiky string numbers, and helped to define a distinctive movement […]
Is it weird to buy soundtracks for films you’ve never seen and basically have no interest in seeing? I dunno. Anyway, I kind of impulse-purchased this, what with it being limited edition and all. I’ve never met an Erik K Skodvin (Svarte Greiner, Deaf Center) record I didn’t like, and Raúl Pastor Medall aka Rauelsson has […]
This release was pretty exciting to me, given my feelings about all the protagonists: Jóhann Jóhannsson’s The Miners’ Hymns was one of my albums of 2011, Hildur Guðnadóttir’s Leyfðu Ljósinu was one of my albums of 2012, and Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe’s FRKWYS collaboration with Ariel Kalma, We Know Each Other Somehow, is bound to be on the […]
This one is right on the cusp of the modern classical / ambient thing. Strings and electronics blend seamlessly together to shimmering, atmospheric effect. The sleeve notes explain that the title refers to “an ancient Chinese tradition… of a fundamental tone that relates to society’s place in the cosmic order”: while I don’t think there […]
I have to admit, this isn’t what I was expecting. I’ve heard Erik K Skodvin in contemplative mode as half of Deaf Center, and in doom-drone mode as Svarte Greiner. This is a much looser business, with open, clattering percussion, abstract cello scraping and clarinet tootling, half-prepared-sounding piano, and on the one-minute-long near-title-track Flames a big […]
From the first few notes, it’s obvious what this album is going to be like: delicate, intimate piano compositions, recorded with that close-miked sound which is Nils Frahm’s trademark. Handily, that’s a thing I really like, and it seems to have gone somewhat out of fashion, so this record — the debut solo album by […]
This record has a wonderfully fresh take on the modern classical template, and I can’t quite put my finger on what it’s doing. We get sonorous chimes, tinkling pianos, and atmospheric strings. We get some jazzy touches, like the soulful reed instruments and the percussion’s tendency towards soft brushes and hand-claps. We get a subtle […]
