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viewing 1 To 18 of 18 items
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MEGA 037CD
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Jac Berrocal and David Fenech have been recording music together for more than ten years now... After albums with Ghédalia Tazartès (RIP) and Vincent Epplay, they shared the stage with musicians such as Felix Kubin, Jean-Hervé Peron, Jean Noel Cognard, and Thierry Müller (Illitch)... Now they are now joined by the American improviser Jason Willett (Half Japanese) for their first album as a trio. Built around a recording session in Paris, the three musicians created Xmas In March, an album of seven new peppermint-striped favorites. The tracks are like smoldering embers, mixed with the excitement and anticipation of Santa's arrival. Jac Berrocal's sound has never been so smooth since the Hotel Hotel album -- his trumpet like a sleigh in a jet stream. Willett plays bass with a rubber band and creates an impossibly huge sound from such a tiny "instrument" (like Charlie Haden played from a matchbox). He also plays this rare wooden synthesizer called Cocoquantus. Fenech sings, plays electric guitar, turntables, and is responsible for the recording as well as mixing all the tracks. With special guest Vincent Epplay on the closing track. This is the album you will want under the tree... skirt. Joyeux Noël! Cut by Andreas "Lupo" Lubich. LP version comes in edition of 300.
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MEGA 037LP
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LP version. Edition of 300. Jac Berrocal and David Fenech have been recording music together for more than ten years now... After albums with Ghédalia Tazartès (RIP) and Vincent Epplay, they shared the stage with musicians such as Felix Kubin, Jean-Hervé Peron, Jean Noel Cognard, and Thierry Müller (Illitch)... Now they are now joined by the American improviser Jason Willett (Half Japanese) for their first album as a trio. Built around a recording session in Paris, the three musicians created Xmas In March, an album of seven new peppermint-striped favorites. The tracks are like smoldering embers, mixed with the excitement and anticipation of Santa's arrival. Jac Berrocal's sound has never been so smooth since the Hotel Hotel album -- his trumpet like a sleigh in a jet stream. Willett plays bass with a rubber band and creates an impossibly huge sound from such a tiny "instrument" (like Charlie Haden played from a matchbox). He also plays this rare wooden synthesizer called Cocoquantus. Fenech sings, plays electric guitar, turntables, and is responsible for the recording as well as mixing all the tracks. With special guest Vincent Epplay on the closing track. This is the album you will want under the tree... skirt. Joyeux Noël! Cut by Andreas "Lupo" Lubich.
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MEGA 036CD
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Megaphone and Knock'em Dead Records present the long-awaited second album by Austin, Texas based Stop Motion Orchestra. On Lightworks, the group draws on influences ranging from Henry Cow, Magma, Haniwa-Chan, and Picchio Dal Pozzo, to traditional music from Eastern Europe and South Asia. While the musicians who appear on Lightworks have extensive resumés in Austin's progressive and experimental scenes, the collective voice that emerges across the five instrumental works transcends both scene and genre, revealing a close-knit telepathic unit at the height of their powers. The tracks deliver thunderous juxtapositions of style in the spirit of the "rock in opposition" movement: Eastern folk melodies played on sax and violin are interlaced with synthesized bass lines and layered electric and acoustic guitars; meticulous notation is balanced by a raw, DIY aesthetic that emphasizes texture, and atmosphere; ancient myths are given a new soundtrack for the 21st century.
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MEGA 036LP
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LP version. Megaphone and Knock'em Dead Records present the long-awaited second album by Austin, Texas based Stop Motion Orchestra. On Lightworks, the group draws on influences ranging from Henry Cow, Magma, Haniwa-Chan, and Picchio Dal Pozzo, to traditional music from Eastern Europe and South Asia. While the musicians who appear on Lightworks have extensive resumés in Austin's progressive and experimental scenes, the collective voice that emerges across the five instrumental works transcends both scene and genre, revealing a close-knit telepathic unit at the height of their powers. The tracks deliver thunderous juxtapositions of style in the spirit of the "rock in opposition" movement: Eastern folk melodies played on sax and violin are interlaced with synthesized bass lines and layered electric and acoustic guitars; meticulous notation is balanced by a raw, DIY aesthetic that emphasizes texture, and atmosphere; ancient myths are given a new soundtrack for the 21st century.
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MEGA 035LP
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Megaphone and Knock Em' Dead present a reissue of Guigou Chenevier and Sophie Jausserand's A l'Abri Des Micro-Climats, originally released on RecRec Music in 1984. Guigou Chenevier was the drummer of Etron Fou Leloublan, a band that was barely like any other. To describe them in words could only take a mind so far to the reality of what they were like -- Eccentric, absurd, whimsical, and distinct are words that come to mind. Every member was a big part of their distinction. Guigou played extremely driven, tight rhythms that cut through previous human rhythmic logic, even though progressive rock was exploring new rhythms for years beforehand. A year before Etron Fou Leloublan's last record, Face Aux Elements Dechaines (1985), Guigou released his second solo album, A l'Abri Des Micro-Climats, or in English, "In the Shelter of Microclimates". A l'Abri Des Micro-Climats is a concept-album based on a series of non-conventional "songs", composed by Guigou Chenevier and his wife Sophie Jausserand. Sophie wrote a big part of the lyrics of this album, sings on some songs (also as a duo with Guigou in "La Maladie des Fourmis"), and she also realized all the sleeve design of the album with the whale. Sophie and Guigou also used two poems by Sophie's father for this project on "Vive l'Anarchie" and "Ecartelage". They also invited some musician friends to add some parts on this record: Guy Sapin on guitar (Guigou played many years together with Guy with different groups like Encore Plus Grande, Octavo, or Barbarie Légère, amongst others), Dominique Grimaud on synths (of Video Aventures; Dominique participated to Guigou's theater and music project Le Diapason du Père Ubu in 1990-93), and Christiane Cohade on bass (of French groups Les I and the female quartet Virgule IV). A lost treasure that will surely captivate and intrigue listeners, now brought back to life. Edition of 300.
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MEGA 034CD
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One fine evening in Rotterdam, after witnessing him walking around in a circle with a stick for half-an-hour, Lukas Simonis asked Dominic Robertson (aka Ergo Phizmiz) to join him in a rapid-fire songwriting bonanza. Many songs resulted, tunes about mermaids, mistakes, compost manufacture, celebrity perverts, geometry, and so on. Lukas is a guitar wizard and a king in the world of weirdoes. Dominic is just... a weirdo, but he is England's greatest entertainer, so that's ok. Make way, roll out the red carpet for songs about Satan, sorrows, the woes of the rock n' roll lifestyle, and scorpions, engaging instruments like guitars, drums, flutes, cellos, tubas, and trumpets. So, you might want to know, what kind of music this vortex turned into: Imagine a strangely, brilliant intersection among Wire, R. Stevie Moore, Bonzo Dog Band, and XTC, with quite a bit of ruminating... but a most delightful, kaleidoscopic confection for the ear. CD version includes two bonus tracks; Edition of 500.
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LP
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MEGA 034LP
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LP version. Edition of 300. One fine evening in Rotterdam, after witnessing him walking around in a circle with a stick for half-an-hour, Lukas Simonis asked Dominic Robertson (aka Ergo Phizmiz) to join him in a rapid-fire songwriting bonanza. Many songs resulted, tunes about mermaids, mistakes, compost manufacture, celebrity perverts, geometry, and so on. Lukas is a guitar wizard and a king in the world of weirdoes. Dominic is just... a weirdo, but he is England's greatest entertainer, so that's ok. Make way, roll out the red carpet for songs about Satan, sorrows, the woes of the rock n' roll lifestyle, and scorpions, engaging instruments like guitars, drums, flutes, cellos, tubas, and trumpets. So, you might want to know, what kind of music this vortex turned into: Imagine a strangely, brilliant intersection among Wire, R. Stevie Moore, Bonzo Dog Band, and XTC, with quite a bit of ruminating... but a most delightful, kaleidoscopic confection for the ear.
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MEGA 030LP
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160-gram LP. Gatefold sleeve with new artwork. The elusive allure of Vidéo-Aventures is challenging to capture, and Megaphone/Knock'em Dead's reissue of their second LP, Camera (In Focus) Camera (Al Riparo) (1984, Tago Mago, France), reveals an album with a conviction in paradox that serves only to magnify their mystery. Plunging feverishly where their debut (Musique pour Garçons et Filles, 1979, Recommended Records) traipsed and alighted with informed whimsy, Camera (In Focus) Camera (Al Riparo) retains the duo of Dominique Grimaud and Monique Alba, abetted strikingly (and, often, surprisingly) by Jac Berrocal, Guigou Chenevier (Etron Fou Leloublan), Sophie Jausserand, Gilbert Artman (Lard Free, Catalogue, Urban Sax), Cyril Lefebvre, and Daniel Deshays. The result is a tour de force in several significant respects. Camera (In Focus) Camera (Al Riparo) is not obviously similar to its beguiling predecessor -- indeed, there are moments in which it calls for the listener's intrepidity and insight -- but it is at least as captivating. Venturing further from traditional instrumentation, Vidéo-Aventures employ elements of musique concrète, disjointed and enfeebled speech, accelerated percussion, and synthesized physical function (pulse, breathing, etc.). The chronicle of a singular process from a single perspective, it narrates the deterioration of a mind in the aftermath of duress. That mind is the narrator, but only from a sensory standpoint, as if the listener were seated inside the narrator's skull. What the listener hears is what the subject hears -- complete with pounding heartbeat, gasping breath, blood rushing through the head -- amounting to a devastating treatise against ends justifying means. Regardless of interpretation, Camera (In Focus) Camera (Al Riparo) succeeds on its own extensive musical merits. This record is borne of the dissonant, microscopic interim between impulse and accordant action. The change that occurs within that tiny lag is seldom heralded, but on Camera (In Focus) Camera (Al Riparo), Vidéo-Aventures inhabits it, isolating the transformation/mutation that crystallizes in flashes both smaller than fully formed thoughts and containing the universe of perception. Within each track, Vidéo-Aventures present an evolution, but not a hierarchical one -- in the specificity of their arrangements, they convey an instability that is unnervingly true to the variability and unpredictability of memory. This quality, which had punctuated their debut album, becomes here a harrowing pillar that unites every track within a claustrophobic continuum of emotions. The result is an opus that contains seamless and varied musical brilliance, conceptual continuity, and indomitably humane integrity.
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MEGA 032LP
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Edition of 200; includes hand-numbered inner sleeve. Stepmother is Lukas Simonis (Dull Schicksal, VRIL, Coolhaven...), Jeroen Visser (Kazanchis, ./morFrom/....), Bill Gilonis (The Work, The Hat Shoes, Hail...), and David Kerman (5UU's, Present, Thinking Plague, Aranis...). Anglo-American-Dutch post-punk prog-rock and experimental soundscapes with a dash of Monty Python thrown in. A reunion of an '80s band that never existed (but should have): twangy guitars, nifty keyboards, zany drumming, vocal histrionics à la The Rutles (well, sort of), lop-sided rhythms, regurgitated spam lyrics. What more could you ask for? The journey we are taken on introduces us to mass murderer Curtis Lemay, Serge Gainsbourg, sex ads, neo-liberal communism, Nigerian online scams, neo-surrealist blabbering, and Dickensian psycho fluff. But the record is much more than a sum of its parts -- and it's beautifully packaged to boot, with artwork by Alfred Boland. Bill Gilonis: voice, guitar, bass, keyboards, clarinet, stylophone; Lukas Simonis: voice, guitar, wooden thing; Jeroen Visser: voice, bass, organ, synth, clarinet, baritone sax; David Kerman: drums, percussion.
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CD
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MEGA 032CD
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Stepmother is Lukas Simonis (Dull Schicksal, VRIL, Coolhaven...), Jeroen Visser (Kazanchis, ./morFrom/....), Bill Gilonis (The Work, The Hat Shoes, Hail...), and David Kerman (5UU's, Present, Thinking Plague, Aranis...). Anglo-American-Dutch post-punk prog-rock and experimental soundscapes with a dash of Monty Python thrown in. A reunion of an '80s band that never existed (but should have): twangy guitars, nifty keyboards, zany drumming, vocal histrionics à la The Rutles (well, sort of), lop-sided rhythms, regurgitated spam lyrics. What more could you ask for? The journey we are taken on introduces us to mass murderer Curtis Lemay, Serge Gainsbourg, sex ads, neo-liberal communism, Nigerian online scams, neo-surrealist blabbering, and Dickensian psycho fluff. But the record is much more than a sum of its parts -- and it's beautifully packaged to boot, with artwork by Alfred Boland. Bill Gilonis: voice, guitar, bass, keyboards, clarinet, stylophone; Lukas Simonis: voice, guitar, wooden thing; Jeroen Visser: voice, bass, organ, synth, clarinet, baritone sax; David Kerman: drums, percussion.
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LP
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MEGA 027LP
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Pressed on 180-gram vinyl; includes 23" x 23" foldout poster. Originally issued in 1981, Miniatures is a concept compilation album that is certain to delight the listener on a multitude of fronts simultaneously. Conceived in 1980 by Morgan Fisher (erstwhile keyboardist for Mott the Hoople) as a means of addressing the scope of music and musicians that he loved but lacked time enough to release, Miniatures draws from an array of artists whose submissions exist within the strict framework of a 60-second maximum track length. The pieces wriggle excitedly in their rapid and unrelenting succession, sequenced with insight sufficient to create an infinitely curious netherworld. Contributors provide their chosen 60 seconds of indulgence -- be it Andy Partridge offering "The History of Rock'n'Roll," noted author/psychoanalyst R. D. Laing giving us a father/son duet of "Tipperary," or Roger McGough reciting "The Wreck of the Hesperus" in its entirety -- and, while each track offers a distinct and separate thrill, the whole of Miniatures is both a monument to the creativity of its time and a living reminder of humanity in its preposterous glory. With no room for filler of any kind, Miniatures is a consistently refreshing revelation. Filled with abrupt, often beautiful, utterances from a bewildering diversity of artists (what other album contains both Pete Seeger and The Residents?), Miniatures is imbued throughout with self-awareness that, beneath an umbrella of shared and voluntary absurdity, scuppers any veneer of remoteness. In its place lies the intersection of naked curiosity with love of music. Includes tracks by Ollie Halsall & John Halsey, The Residents, Roger McGough, Morgan Fisher, John Otway, Pete Challis & Phil Diplock, Robert Wyatt, Stinky Winkles, Mary Longford, Andy 'Thunderclap' Newman, David Bedford, Fred Frith, Maggie Nicols, Joseph Racaille, The Work, Neil Innes & Son, Herbert Distel, Lol Coxhill, Ken Ellis, Steve Miller, Norman Lovett, Patrick Portella, George Melly, Robert Fripp, Andy Partridge (XTC), Phantom Captain, Ron Geesin, Alejandro Viñao, Quentin Crisp, Simon Desorgher, Ralph Steadman, R.D.Laing & Son, Trevor Wishart, John White, Ivor Cutler, Hector Zazou, Michael Bass & Ellen Tenenbaum, Martin Chambers (The Pretenders), Bob Cobbing & Henri Chopin, Dave Vanian (The Damned), Metabolist, Gavin Bryars, 1/2 Japanese, Simon Jeffes, Mark Perry, Michael Nyman, David Cunningham (The Flying Lizards), Kevin Coyne, Etron Fou Leloublan, Neil Oram & Ken Campbell & The Science Fiction Theatre of Liverpool, and Pete Seeger.
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MEGA 031CD
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Based in Baltimore, M.C. Schmidt is one half of the acclaimed electronic duo Matmos. As half of Matmos, Schmidt has worked with Terry Riley, Björk, Kronos Quartet, Peter Rehberg, INA-GRM, Rrose, Marshall Allen, Horse Lords, People Like Us, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Antony Hegarty, William Basinski, and many more. Batu Malablab, his first solo album, works a dislocating magic, indulging in a tradition of western fantasy of non-western music. Recalling gamelan-inspired experimental classics such as John Cage's prepared piano work, Can's "Ethnological Forgery Series," and Jon Hassell's "Fourth World" ambient music (GB 019CD/LP), Batu Malablab is imaginary global music made in the Baltimore basement studio pictured on the back of the album. Features appearances by Wobbly and Thomas Dimuzio.
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MEGA 031LP
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LP version. Based in Baltimore, M.C. Schmidt is one half of the acclaimed electronic duo Matmos. As half of Matmos, Schmidt has worked with Terry Riley, Björk, Kronos Quartet, Peter Rehberg, INA-GRM, Rrose, Marshall Allen, Horse Lords, People Like Us, Keith Fullerton Whitman, Antony Hegarty, William Basinski, and many more. Batu Malablab, his first solo album, works a dislocating magic, indulging in a tradition of western fantasy of non-western music. Recalling gamelan-inspired experimental classics such as John Cage's prepared piano work, Can's "Ethnological Forgery Series," and Jon Hassell's "Fourth World" ambient music (GB 019CD/LP), Batu Malablab is imaginary global music made in the Baltimore basement studio pictured on the back of the album. Features appearances by Wobbly and Thomas Dimuzio.
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LP + 7"
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MEGA 026LP
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First vinyl reissue of 1982's Slow Crimes by The Work. Reissued on CD with bonus tracks by Megaphone in 1991, Slow Crimes is a little-known treasure of transformative magnitude. The Work were formed in 1979 by saxophonist Tim Hodgkinson (following the dissolution of Henry Cow), guitarist Bill Gilonis, bassist Mick Hobbs, and drummer Rick Wilson, although Slow Crimes showcases each member on a variety of instruments. Also featured is Catherine Jauniaux on guest vocals throughout the album. The Work's inaugural LP release, Slow Crimes is so rabidly articulate that it presides over and resides in a world very much unto itself. While falling within the loosest guidelines of "post-punk," the term is a misnomer, for the textural intricacies and distinct deliberacy throughout Slow Crimes bespeak both an utterly unique collective identity and a startling fluency with its own language. It takes the vibrant urgency of punk rock and catalyzes it into a continually fascinating mosaic. This reissue includes a bonus 7" with concurrent compilation tracks "Anxious About Meaning" and "One Swallow."
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MEGA 025CD
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Officer! is either Mick Hobbs (The Work, Family Fodder, Half Japanese) alone or Mick Hobbs with friends. Ossification is like an amazing party held at This Heat's Cold Storage Studio, with friends like Felix Fiedorowicz, Tom Cora, Tim Hodgkinson, Bill Gilonis, Zeena Parkins, Patrick Q, and Catherine Jauniaux. The output of this party is one of the most unusual, pleasurable, and character-filled "pop" records anyone has heard. Fourteen songs that contain the spirit of pop, rock, classical, medieval, avant garde, R.I.O., The Work, Family Fodder, This Heat, Look de Bouk, Legendary Pink Dots, Henry Cow, and more. Ossification is a timeless anomaly in the history of recorded music. Remastered by Tim Dimuzio. Recorded in This Heat's Cold Storage Studio in 1984. Includes an eight-page lyric booklet.
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MEGA 025LP
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Officer! is either Mick Hobbs (The Work, Family Fodder, Half Japanese) alone or Mick Hobbs with friends. Ossification is like an amazing party held at This Heat's Cold Storage Studio, with friends like Felix Fiedorowicz, Tom Cora, Tim Hodgkinson, Bill Gilonis, Zeena Parkins, Patrick Q, and Catherine Jauniaux. The output of this party is one of the most unusual, pleasurable, and character-filled "pop" records anyone has heard. Fourteen songs that contain the spirit of pop, rock, classical, medieval, avant garde, R.I.O., The Work, Family Fodder, This Heat, Look de Bouk, Legendary Pink Dots, Henry Cow, and more. Ossification is a timeless anomaly in the history of recorded music. Limited to 700 copies on 180 gram vinyl with an insert. Remastered by Tim Dimuzio. Recorded in This Heat's Cold Storage Studio in 1984.
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MEGA 026CD
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The Megaphone & Knock 'em Dead labels present the fifth release from improvising trio Konk Pack. Konk Pack are a two-thirds British and one-third Austrian "organic" improvisational group. Their music can be very delicate and light but when they get hot and bothered, it's like being inside of a hurricane, an earthquake and an electrical storm, all at the same time. All three members of Konk Pack have been improvising for decades with musicians like Lol Coxhill, Cecil Taylor, Tom Cora, Alan Silva, Evan Parker, Marcus Schmickler, Fred Frith, and Charles Gayle. The way that they improvise together is like a swarm of bees or a school of fish (sometimes piranhas). This is not intellectual music. Konk Pack draws from deep reserves of experience and expertise: from Tim Hodgkinson's prog roots in Henry Cow to his post-punk RIO reinvention with The Work, from Roger Turner's roots in the UK's experimental scene working with improvisational music legends like Derek Bailey, Cecil Taylor and William Parker, and from Thomas Lehn's analog explorations with German electronic music composer Markus Schmickler and his work with the Ex. Because of, or perhaps, in spite of, their incredible resumés, Konk Pack's work is still singular among all electro-acoustic improvisation occurring today. Their music is an exercise in extreme dynamics that range from spacious and semi-silent tonal streaks to full out onslaughts that open doors to vast tidal waves of static, set to crash straight into the audience. Thomas' synthesizer sometimes crackles like an old AM radio in a hurricane amidst the shrieks and shudders Hodgkinson tears from his lap steel. Roger Turner's percussion could be anywhere from thrashing out a crying anarchy as though he is drowning in his band's own conjured undertow to pulling gentle creaks and whistles from the stretched membranes before him. For sheer depth of sound, breadth of vision and raw skill, practically any given American Underground or Japanese noise outfit could right now be eating their dust. Tim Hodgkinson (lap steel guitar); Thomas Lehn (analog synthesizer), Roger Turner (drumset & percussion). Recorded at Café OTO, London on December 18, 2012.
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2LP
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MEGA 024LP
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R. Stevie Moore's music sounds like so many different things, yet like no one else. He's been making home recordings since the late '60s as an underground artist and only now is he seeing a much larger recognition of his work. His friend Jason Willett compiled this record over the course of 17 years, digging deep into Stevie's cassette catalog. Hearing Aid is a collection of Stevie's songs that cover a wide range of variety: pop genius, sublime instrumental country surf, electronic experiments, bizarre spoken-word theater, dark disco rock, field recordings, etc. The end result is not a "greatest hits" collection but rather a diverse sculpture of the early world of R. Stevie Moore. This is one of the only readily available R. Stevie releases and 95% of Hearing Aid has never appeared before on vinyl. It features 32 songs that were recorded from the late '60s to the early '80s, over 87 minutes of audio. This compilation of rare tracks is produced on limited double LP vinyl only, in a deluxe gatefold sleeve (featuring 284 images of R. Stevie).
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