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LP
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MIA 046LP
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The Log and the Leeway follows a six-year journey of personal exploration and drastic change for Bram Bosteels and his singular Kaboom Karavan universe. What entails is a sound-curiosity of rare format, following a metamorphosis that goes beyond the musical. Early in the process, Bram was struck by the word/concept of a "Leeway": the gradual departure from an intended course due to external influences. Following a boyish fascination for explorers' travel journals, logbooks, and the farfetched corners of the world, he could not have foreseen how fitting of a title he had chosen. Drastically all of a sudden one day, completely unexpectedly, Bram experienced his own father dying in front of him from a rare disease. Shocked and confused by this intense encounter, his perspectives and musical course departed from its original path. But at the same time, it was an enlightenment and a necessary influence for him to realize the initial idea and finish this album, started over half a decade before. The ones familiar with Kaboom Karavan already know that nothing really sounds quite like it. Bram's musical (and non-musical) universe is of the rare breed that seems to be entirely his own. Self-contained, but never opaque. Quite the opposite actually. Bram never pushes us away, instead, by listening to his music we are given view to a synesthetic wunderkammer of images, places, objects, and possibilities. Distant but magnetic, alien but intimately familiar, Kaboom is folk music from another dimension. Listening to The Log and the Leeway is like waking up next to a bonfire in the middle of a swamp wearing somebody else's clothes: you may not know how you got here, but whatever is happening seems to very directly involve you. Note from Erik K Skodvin (Miasmah): "All the sounds, fabrics, instrumentation, and stories that binds The Log and the Leeway together go far beyond what can be touched up in this simple writeup. As someone who have followed this journey since the beginning, and seen it shift from lighthearted fun to the most crepuscular personal experience, heard the stories behind (almost) every field recording and gone through boundless amounts of clips, visual details, notes, and inspirations..." Cover painting by John Lurie. 16-page booklet of illustrations/collagés by Walter Dhoogh and Erik K Skodvin that more or less connects (or confuses) the dots between the music and stories behind. Mastered by Lupo at Loop-O. Edition of 200; includes download code.
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CD
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MIA 024CD
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Bram Bosteels' Kaboom Karavan project reappears out of the thick Belgian jungle to deliver what must be one of the strangest and most exotic records since Gultskra Artikler's uncategorizable Kasha iz Topora. After the already quite surreal Barra Barra (MIA 015CD/LP) album on Miasmah from 2011, Bram takes his sound further into unknown yet still strangely familiar territories. Listening to Hokus Fokus feels like staring frozenly into a postcard sent from your long-lost uncle that went missing in the Amazon after an expedition gone wrong (circa year 1935). Merge this image with the decaying sounds of an old Tom Waits record slowly tuning out in the background and you're getting close. This is not instantly gratifiable music, but rather, a thick fog of details, sounds and atmospheres blended together with utmost precision and skill to create something quite unique that really shines with repeated listening and full immersion. Coming from a background as a notorious piano husk experimenter, film, theater, and dance composer, as well as regular Kreng collaborator, Bram has set off to confuse and wonder us with this selection of highly amazing Kaboom Karavan alternate-universe pieces fittingly entitled Hokus Fokus. For fans of '50s exotica records, Jeff Beal's score for Carnivalé (the TV show) and Andy Votel/Demdike Stare-curated Pre-Cert entertainment (with artists such as Anworth Kirk and Slant Azymuth).
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LP
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MIA 024LP
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LP version with download code. Bram Bosteels' Kaboom Karavan project reappears out of the thick Belgian jungle to deliver what must be one of the strangest and most exotic records since Gultskra Artikler's uncategorizable Kasha iz Topora. After the already quite surreal Barra Barra (MIA 015CD/LP) album on Miasmah from 2011, Bram takes his sound further into unknown yet still strangely familiar territories. Listening to Hokus Fokus feels like staring frozenly into a postcard sent from your long-lost uncle that went missing in the Amazon after an expedition gone wrong (circa year 1935). Merge this image with the decaying sounds of an old Tom Waits record slowly tuning out in the background and you're getting close. This is not instantly gratifiable music, but rather, a thick fog of details, sounds and atmospheres blended together with utmost precision and skill to create something quite unique that really shines with repeated listening and full immersion. Coming from a background as a notorious piano husk experimenter, film, theater, and dance composer, as well as regular Kreng collaborator, Bram has set off to confuse and wonder us with this selection of highly amazing Kaboom Karavan alternate-universe pieces fittingly entitled Hokus Fokus. For fans of '50s exotica records, Jeff Beal's score for Carnivalé (the TV show) and Andy Votel/Demdike Stare-curated Pre-Cert entertainment (with artists such as Anworth Kirk and Slant Azymuth).
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LP
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MIA 025LP
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Short Walk With Olaf is Kaboom Karavan's debut album from 2007 that appeared as a freely downloadable album on the Mexican-based imprint Umor Rex, creating a cult following in the MP3 label scene at the time. Finally now properly mastered and given a well-deserved vinyl release. Mixing influences from the electronica and ambient scene with Americana, free-folk and avant-garde jazz, to name but a few, Short Walk With Olaf is first of all an incredibly beautiful and mystical piece of work that should fall in taste with everyone interested in film music, travels, small villages & deserted places. Olaf finds his place somewhere between the atmosphere of Jim Jarmusch films, Lounge Lizards and Volcano The Bear and is a great starting point for getting into the strange sound world of Kaboom Karavan. Includes a free mp3 download of the album.
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CD
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MIA 015CD
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This is the debut full-length release on Miasmah from Kaboom Karavan -- the Belgian collective led by Bram Bosteels. Kaboom Karavan has a history in theater, film and contemporary dance, but that doesn't really help shine a light on their music. They have collaborated with musicians all over the world including Miasmah's very own Kreng, and released a debut album on Mexico's Umor Rex imprint, but again, this probably only gives a small indicator of what the collective actually sound like. There is something effortlessly surreal about the band, and surrealism is an aspect of art often attempted and very rarely perfected. Here, Bosteels abuses his choice of instruments (and players) to the point where the listener would barely be able to place which instruments were being used at all, in fact at times you'd be hard pressed even to place what sort of music it was. Through a haze of pizzicato strings, clouds of sullen reverberation and clamorous percussion, you get the feeling that you have been catapulted into a universe just outside of perception. Jazz and Dadaism might be the cornerstones of Barra Barra but these disparate influences are twisted and melted beyond recognition, leaving only remnants on the finished product. Barra Barra is a complex album which takes patience to navigate through; you could hear the German clanking pre-industrialism of Einstürzende Neubauten, the slow, brooding doom of Bohren & Der Club Of Gore and the stuttering abstraction of Black To Comm, yet it still feels fresh and distinctly current. Unusually, the most fitting comparison might be the work of The Brothers Quay, as the ticking, creaking, stuttering songs feel perfectly matched with these flickering, haunted images. This is what makes the album such an appropriate addition to the Miasmah canon, and one that will haunt your dreams (and nightmares) for months to come.
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MIA 015LP
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LP version. This is the debut full-length release on Miasmah from Kaboom Karavan -- the Belgian collective led by Bram Bosteels. Kaboom Karavan has a history in theater, film and contemporary dance, but that doesn't really help shine a light on their music. They have collaborated with musicians all over the world including Miasmah's very own Kreng, and released a debut album on Mexico's Umor Rex imprint, but again, this probably only gives a small indicator of what the collective actually sound like. There is something effortlessly surreal about the band, and surrealism is an aspect of art often attempted and very rarely perfected. Here, Bosteels abuses his choice of instruments (and players) to the point where the listener would barely be able to place which instruments were being used at all, in fact at times you'd be hard pressed even to place what sort of music it was. Through a haze of pizzicato strings, clouds of sullen reverberation and clamorous percussion, you get the feeling that you have been catapulted into a universe just outside of perception. Jazz and Dadaism might be the cornerstones of Barra Barra but these disparate influences are twisted and melted beyond recognition, leaving only remnants on the finished product. Barra Barra is a complex album which takes patience to navigate through; you could hear the German clanking pre-industrialism of Einstürzende Neubauten, the slow, brooding doom of Bohren & Der Club Of Gore and the stuttering abstraction of Black To Comm, yet it still feels fresh and distinctly current. Unusually, the most fitting comparison might be the work of The Brothers Quay, as the ticking, creaking, stuttering songs feel perfectly matched with these flickering, haunted images. This is what makes the album such an appropriate addition to the Miasmah canon, and one that will haunt your dreams (and nightmares) for months to come. Includes a free mp3 download coupon.
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