Experimental/Electronic

The Japanese producer and DJ Kuniyuki Takahashi is the subject of Music From Memory’s latest retrospective compilation with ‘Early Tape Works - 1986-1993’. Composed of two volumes, the compilations gather together a selection of tracks from a tiny run of privately released tape only albums, highlighting a fascinating early period in Kuniyuki’s musical output, one of which little is known.After discovering the world of nightclubs in Japan around 1986, and the seemingly boundless freedom expressed there through music as well as art, Kuniyuki became inspired to experiment with electronic music. Excited by the possibilities of new music technology, he would begin to gather together a number of, at that time, reasonably accessible and inexpensive local keyboards, drum computers and recording equipment. This became for Kuniyuki a way in which to explore music not as such made for nightclubs, but certainly inspired by them. Setting up a home studio in his hometown of Saporro, Kuniyuki would record extensively during this period with the equipment he had gathered together, equipment such as Roland’s Juno60, TR-606, TB-303, Casio FZ-1, Korg 770, Boss DE-200, Foster A8 and a Yamaha MT44 track cassette recorder.Driven to develop a musical language derived as much by an exploration of music technology and a desire to create new sounds, Kuniyuki was also looking to evolve the possibilities of what he refers to as a ‘new Oriental sound’. Early Tape Works - 1986-1993’ then brings together two albums of material which not only highlights the evolution of Kuniyuki’s own work but also of Japanese electronic music as a whole."

Left Ear are re-introducing another ten lost tracks from Nicholas Georgieff and Virgil Work, St Louis' basement electronics duo Workdub.The release spans material from 1989-95 and includes recordings from their sole LP and both cassette albums. Workdub’s music hardly fits into a vacuum and some might even say it’s otherworldly. Tracks like “Reach for the Stars” and “Lunar Module” reflect dreams of space-age exploration, all the while their investigation into drum machines, synthesizers, samples and digital fx’s matched with their organic live instrumentation work to create a unique atmospheric dubbed out sound.

"Prelude" EP is the inceptive release of Oxmose, which marks the first entry in an ongoing catalogue, and the beginning of a journey with various artists.At its heart, the "Prelude" EP is a dialogue between two composers; a conversation that traces the line between abstract, electronic experimentalism and gliterring interpretive jazz.Parisian producer Shcaa takes control of Side A with 'Core'; a near 20 minutes exploration into sound, which skirts the fringes of avant-garde minimalism and experimental rhythms. The song's acute cadence lays a dense and atmospheric foundation for the EP.Side B sees Romanian artist Traian Chereches offer-up an absorbing counterpoint to Shcaa's opener on 'Cage'. The energy of Chereches' rebuttal fuses organic and interpretive sounds into a deft jazz reinterpretation, revealing a wide and surprising cinematic ambience. Mastered by Rashad Becker from Dubplates & Mastering Berlin, "Prelude" will be released on limited edition 12", 180g heavyweight vinyl - with an outer sleeve featuring handmade artwork created by graphic designer Alice Voinea. The organic materials used in her work, emphasizing the interchange of the record; adding a further layer of continuity; one that streches between the artist, the music and the listener.Written by Tom Fenwick

Music From Memory's final compilation of 2017 sees the release of the double album “1 by 1”, which brings together the works of American experimental musician Geoffrey Landers. During a period spanning from 1979 to 1987, this Denver, Colorado based multi-instrumentalist, composer, record producer and engineer, conceived several solo albums. Only two of these, “The Ever Decimal Pulse” and “Habitual Features” along with the single “Breedlove” were ever released on vinyl.Being heavily involved in the local industrial/punk/new wave scene and wanting to create a recording studio “available to record artists regardless of their financial circumstances” Landers set up “The Packing House Studio” in 1981. This analog 8-track recording facility was located in a former slaughterhouse in the stockyards of Denver and was a place of significant activity for the next three years with the studio releasing recordings from numerous artists most notably Allen Ginsberg.It was here that Geoffrey Landers also started his own aptly named “Cauhaus” label. Indicative of the underground/DIYculture, “Cauhaus” was a subsiduary of a label called Local Anaesthetics which was started as an in-store label by independent Denver record store Wax Trax. Typically Cauhaus releases were only pressed up in small quantities and independently distributed, making Lander's music essentially elusive to a wide audience. After relocating in 1984 to an art district of Denver Landers opened the “Cauhaus Institute of Recording” studio where he continued to produce music for soundtracks, art and multi media projects for the next three years, after which Landers stepped out of the music industry entirely. He currently creates and exhibits mixed-media glass art.Throughout the twenty tracks of "1 by 1", of which six previously appeared on CD only, we are submerged into a wide diversity of musical approaches from Geoffrey Landers. From the proto-house track “Logarhythms” and the heart breaking New-Wave Boogie/Funk of “Say You’ll Say So” to the more contemplative pieces such as the oriental insprired “Nisei” and the drenched in sunshine dub/reggae track “Mack” Landers shies away from musical expectations again and again; searching continually for innovative and new forms of expression.

Music From Memory return with their penultimate EP of 2017, this time with four tracks drawn from Virgil ‘Vincent’ Work Jnr’s little-known cassette only debut from 1987, ‘Fast Forward’. Following on from a previous compilation of works taken from one of Virgil’s collaborative projects as the duo ‘Workdub’, this album under simply ‘Vincent’, reflects a more stripped back and raw musical approach from the St. Louis musician.Experimenting with rhythm programming, midi, layering, sequencing, digital effects and sound synthesis the ‘Fast Forward’ sessions grew out of a series of late night jams with Vincent’s brother Scott who was then living in Kansas. With nothing planned in advance and no written music involved in the final recording sessions, the songs that would form ‘Fast Forward’ very much evolved out of improvisation lending a unique often spatial and searching quality to the tracks.Virgil’s equipment at the time very much lead the experimentation with the album being produced on a Yamaha DX7 Synthesizer, Korg DW-8000 Synthesizer, Yamaha RX-15 Drum Machine, Korg SQD-1 Sequencer and a sequential TOM Drum machine. As Virgil himself explains the title of the album in fact came about because it felt “as if I had fast forwarded to a different sound”.Bedroom produced, the Fast Forward album had an initial run of only 100 copies, of which none were commercially available and were simply sent to friends and family along with a handful mailed out to local radio stations in his hometown of St Louis. Although the album received a good response from local radio DJs and music magazines, the album sadly never gained enough momentum or demand for a further run of copies.Fast forward to 2017, exactly thirty years are their production, and Music From Memory are delighted to be able to finally make Vincent’s music commercially available again."

Recorded in Barcelona between 1989 & 1990. Thanks to Nhat-Vu Dang.Special thanks to Hyades Arts Records. All texts on insert and sleeve taken from the "Mudos como piece" collection of poems by Iury Lech.Iury Lech is a transdisciplinary artist of Ukrainian origin part of the few pioneers in the Spanish electronic and digital audio-visual scene that began to develop during the 80's.His open and unclassifiable style made of eerie sonic atmospheres, arrhythmic structures and dense textures create hypnotic ambiance and a new way to conceive experimentalism.Wrongly described as New Age music at that time, "Musica para el fin de los cantos" is a stunning and deeply emotive ambient work, that stares down at the eternal enigma, giving a glimpse of Iury Lech's classical music of the future. Iury recorded this blissful masterpiece in his Barcelona's studio in 1989. It was then published in 1990 by the unique Spanish label Hyades Arts.It's 2017 and it's time to unearth this magical piece of vibrating chords to please your sensitive yet hungry ears. Sit back and enjoy the meditative state.

Staying on the Mediterranean coast for their third release, Music From Memory this time shift their attention to the work of Mallorcan musician Joan Bibiloni.Primarily a guitarist, Bibiloni was creating music at an early age, releasing his first single at the tender age of 15. In his twenties he formed Spanish progrock outfits Zebra and Euterpe where he would meet Pepe Milan, the two of them becoming the bluesy folk duo 'Milan & Bibiloni'. Bibiloni himself would later go on to play with a number of luminary musicians such as Larry Coryell, Daevid Allen and John Cage to name but a few.In 1982 Bibiloni set up his own label Blau in order to highlight the muchoverlooked work of musicians not only on his home island of Mallorca but across the Balearic Islands. In doing so he created a platform not only for local talent but also for his own music to breathe a new life, much influenced by the landscape and life that surrounds the islands.Whilst Bibiloni's first solo releases on his Blau imprint have stronger echoes of contemporary Jazz fusion of the time, it is on the album known as 'Una Vida Llarga I Tranquila' where Bibiloni really began to experiment with new sounds and technologies; fusing tape loops, drum computers and synthesizers.Taking these more electronic infused works as a departure point for the compilation and drawing on material from across his following five albums, "El Sur" sets out to highlight Joan Bibiloni's unique ambient fusion and sun-drenched Mediterranean beach boogie.