Recorded in December 2011 at St Leonards Shoreditch church; this an album of close musical communion, each gesture between the players answered. In particular, Viltard (bass) and Metcalfe (flute) are effective in mimicking each other in high register congealing pools of sound. Thompson (guitar) often foreshadows the more thickly drawn lines of his partners. The… Continue reading Neil Metcalfe / Guillame Viltard / Daniel Thompson – Garden of Water and Light (FRM Records)
Author: earsforeyes
Very amateur music writer
Various Artists – Down To The Silver Sea (Gecophonic)
A phone rings, an echoing voice invites you to tea, someone giggles, a patient jazz beat marks time, church bells ring; this is the utterly beguiling opening to the rather wonderful ‘Down To The Silver Sea’, a compilation of summer evoking oddtronica commissioned from various artists and gathered on a spinning black vinyl disk by… Continue reading Various Artists – Down To The Silver Sea (Gecophonic)
A Winged Victory For The Sullen – Village Underground, Shoreditch, London, 1st October
Supporting A Winged Victory For The Sullen could be a thankless task but Douglas Dare was worthy of his spot. He played a subtle and evocative set of aching torch ballads, wounded vocals soaring over minimal piano compositions, full of storm tossed note clusters and deep plunging chords.A Winged Victory For The Sullen then took to the stage… Continue reading A Winged Victory For The Sullen – Village Underground, Shoreditch, London, 1st October
Otomo Yoshihide Residency (1st Night) with John Butcher, Mark Sanders, Guillaume Viltard, and Mats Gustafsson – Cafe Oto, Dalston, London, 20th September
This first night of the Otomo Yoshihide residency at the Café Oto was, for me, a revelatory introduction to the artist, a night of amazing music. The evening began with a trio of Otomo Yoshihide (guitar), Mark Sanders (drums), and Guillaume Viltard (double bass). A soft spectral opening built to a tense edge of sculpted guitar feedback, Viltard’s… Continue reading Otomo Yoshihide Residency (1st Night) with John Butcher, Mark Sanders, Guillaume Viltard, and Mats Gustafsson – Cafe Oto, Dalston, London, 20th September
Label Interview: Rano Records
Ears for Eyes will be embarking on a series of interviews and profiles of labels, artists, and organisers of club nights; people who have created and released amazing music or found a space and audience for its live performance. For this inaugural entry, we contacted the mighty Rano Records. Rano have released some great music… Continue reading Label Interview: Rano Records
Maurice’s Hotel Death – Hot Jone (Rano)
All albums should consider beginning like ‘Hot Jone’ by Maurice’s Hotel Death: with buzzing insect night chatter, microphone fuzz, and the wet clicking mandibles of unthinkable things; the occasional bass rumble like something large and winged passing overhead. The whole track is like a field recording of a slanted and cracked version of reality, or… Continue reading Maurice’s Hotel Death – Hot Jone (Rano)
Isnaj Dui – Abstracts on Solitude (Hibernate Records)
Isnaj Dui (aka Katie English) is an artist making chamber electronic music with loops, home-made dulcimer and flutes. Fresh from her stunning recent live performance with Dollboy and having heard her work on Front & Follow's 'Collision/Detection' series where she provided an outstanding contribution; I listened to this 2012 release with high expectations which were… Continue reading Isnaj Dui – Abstracts on Solitude (Hibernate Records)
Boat-Ting – Jan Hendrickse + Vivienne Corringham / Benedict Taylor + Tom Jackson / Steve Beresford + Orphy Robinson / Ronnie McGrath – Bar & Co, Temple, London, 16th September
Another great Boat-Ting with a fine mixture of artists.Poet, Ronnie McGrath was like a jazz inflected mind-meld of Burroughs and Pynchon, mouthing sax and trumpet vocalisations and referencing Sun Ra. His rapid, fiery stanzas ran together into surreal streams of consciousness and cyberpunk mantras. McGrath is an entirely absorbing performer, intelligent, humorous and impassioned.Steve Beresford… Continue reading Boat-Ting – Jan Hendrickse + Vivienne Corringham / Benedict Taylor + Tom Jackson / Steve Beresford + Orphy Robinson / Ronnie McGrath – Bar & Co, Temple, London, 16th September
Dollboy with Isnaj Dui – live performance of ‘Ghost Stations/Geisterbahnöfe’ – Thames Tunnel Shaft, Rotherhithe, London, 5th Sept
On a hot early autumn’s night, 50 feet beneath the teeming surface of London, a place of total calm was sanctified with some remarkable and affecting music. The Thames Tunnel Shaft as a music venue is ideal, a decaying chapel of decrepitude; walking down a light-entangled scaffold structure, the audience enters a beautiful lichen soaked… Continue reading Dollboy with Isnaj Dui – live performance of ‘Ghost Stations/Geisterbahnöfe’ – Thames Tunnel Shaft, Rotherhithe, London, 5th Sept
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