Sunday 17 October 2010
Thursday 28 January 2010
Wednesday 25 November 2009
reviews condensed
Solipsism ‘MK Ultra’ (promo). Been a fair old while since Mr Murphy featured in these pages, the workaholic visual / sound artist seems unable to stray past a home recording studio without being possessed of the need to nail a track or three in either of his Shoosh, ch.pm and Solipsism guises - while finding his remaining time taken in heading up Herb recordings imprint. Anyway an email received in our inbox invited us to tune into a taster cut from his currently worked techno based set soon put paid to our embarrassed silence in reporting his ever evolving and cross weaving genre bending cache of aural adventures. ‘MK Ultra’ is a fat n’ spongy slab of hyper driven mind weaving oblivion, the regimental like pulsing and precision honed pushing and shunting trip hop / technoid beats underpin a quietly hypnotic widescreen sounds cape of whirring drone swathes, cosmic swirls and an all round sense of spectral wooziness. Embraced of elements of a classic era Detroit techno scene albeit as though relocated to some distant space hub opining ominous SOS transmissions into the far reaches of the cosmic wilderness - this cerebral cutie mushrooms with a stealth like grandeur to literally bathe your listening space in something that you’d be forgiven for assuming was crafted by the collaborative hand of a secret rendezvous between 808 State and Apollo 440. That said what truly puts the icing on the cake is its busy employment of sonic sub texts running barely out of earshot in the background - like for instance the brief and subtle tropicalia flurries at approx. 4.34 in.
Losing Today
Swirling synths Picked guitar and then left. Soundscapes of uncomfortable beauty Pulses Dadaist in theory and practice Beat with no beat, you dig. The spoken word unspoken, the synthesis of nature formed and then de-con-struct-ed. Drone…and on. The sadness of a modulating tone and the pleasure in its repetition. Explain. SOUND!!! Beautiful in its scope, majestic in its sweep yet personal and claustrophobic. Names: Godspeed, you black Emperor. Explosions in the sky. Fennesz. Yet not quite. An album of outstanding music. That should be heard by all fellow travellers. Enjoy. I did.
Is This Music?
Weirdly wonderful art-rock by Craig Murphy. Challenging listening which won’t be to everyone’s taste
Music To Die For, 50 Top Tunes From Scotland.
As winter is fading away, giving way to new life and new experiences, so too is the overall tune of everything around us. There’s something about spring that brings out the best in people, so it’s suitable to have music that fits this positive aura. Shoosh specialize in a strange mix of acoustic guitar, distorted synths and hopeful ambiance....With these samples of what’s to come from this trio, I’m left hopefully waiting. Not to be blown away, because that’s not what Shoosh tries to accomplish, but rather to be taken on a journey. If they are able to evoke so much day dreaming with just two songs, I can only imagine what they will do with an hour of our time.
The Silent Ballet
Orpheum Circuit is a sweltering sheet of low flying beauty
Igloo Mag
"Shoosh is a trio of musicians, combining guitars and Americana-influenced songwriting with all manner of perplexing electronic programming and treatments. 'Snake Eyes' is a little like Sparklehorse or perhaps Benoit Pioulard - all distorted and twisted out of shape, with a squeaky, obfuscated vocal in place to remind you that you're listening to an actual song rather than the Fennesz-influenced soundscape it might otherwise resemble. The vocal will almost certainly take some getting used to in fact, but once you're accustomed to the sheer oddness of Neil Carlill's delivery (imagine a cross between Dose One and Mark E Smith) there's an awful lot to like about this record - in a world crammed with electronically treated songwriting efforts, Orpheum Circuit somehow manages to sound like it's really out there on its own." Boomkat
The adjectives sweeping, cinematic and symphonic come to the fore. This is music suited to the closing credits of a cathartic, two and a half hour movie epic. Doleful piano lines, dramatic synth washes and grandiose crescendos are the order of the day: like Eno’s Music For Films given the Cecil B DeMille treatment. The tracks have their individual flavours – the synthetic birds, church bells and crickets of “Dark Sun Rising”, for example – but the album works best as a kind of symphony in five movements. It’s music designed for looking from a hilltop and watching the shadows of clouds dancing across lush, rolling fields. Stirring and somehow reassuring at the same time. Music, Musings & Miscellany
This is downtempo, home-listening electronica, but with an edge. Lead track “Bastardism”, a collaboration with Kingbastard, is all steam-punk beats and abstract, cosmic synths. The ENV(itre) and Victer Manderline remixes are cooler, mellower affairs, whereas the charmingly named “Raped by a Woman” remix by Psychotronic is an uncomfortable, glitchy treatment. “Organicism” comes in two versions. The Pleq remix is the stronger, chugging and spluttering along like an eccentric piece of machinery. Music, Musings & Miscellany
The material's galaxial feel and trippy ambiance intensify when distorted voices echo across the limitless expanses of deep space, and nowhere is that epic pitch achieved more intensively than during the title piece which unspools over ten trance-inducing minutes (the sound is so huge, it reduces the voices that occasionally surface to indecipherable mumbles—but the work can be experienced just as easily on purely musical terms as an engrossing exercise in synthetic dronescaping. If anything, its unapologetically pure synth-based sound has more in common with ‘70s-styled ambient recordings (early Tangerine Dream, say) than a more current release where granular static and other noise might accompany the drones. That Alien Genome Project leaves such a strong impression is due in part to the forceful intensity of its presentation.
Textura
The album consists of drones, cosmic synth chords, and disembodied, distorted vocal samples. It has echoes of Kosmische Musik acts like (early) Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schultze as well as their spiritual descendants such as Pete Namlook. But there are equally nods to Stars of the Lid, Eno’s Apollo and Murcof’s Cosmos projects. The eight tracks unfold slowly. Some are short and fragile; others, like the title track, have a suitably cosmic grandeur. “Hybrid”, the closing section, has a slowed down echoing voice that has the rhythm of whale song, and sounds like the last, fading sounds of a dying civilization. It’s quite a spooky end to a seriously trippy suite of music.
Music Miscellany
ch.pm is the solo project of Craig Murphy, perhaps better known as one half of electro-psychedelic outfit Shoosh. ‘Alien Genome Project’, however, is like listening to an old-school ambient record, where melodies shift extremely slowly. Indeed, Tangerine Dream and Brian Eno would certainly approve of Murphy’s work. Leonard's Lair
Shoosh present a far folksier prospect, first with the digitised folk of 'Elastic Soil' - which avoids all that Tunng-style folktronica business thanks to its strained and unhinged vocal - and the rather lovely 'Come In From The Cold', another swirl of guitars, screeching synthesis and that strangely compelling, warped voice.
Boomkat
Weird Fields is a busy boy - it feels almost like he creates videos on weekly basis, judging from the amount of clips he's dished up in the last few months (last time it was a promo for Pestilence by Shoosh). This time Herb Recordings' Kingbastard is the subject: the track used is '[ d o w n u p ]' and the video has a series of flashing pictures, cryptic symbols and phrases. Weird Fields has probably filled the whole thing with subliminal messages too, so who knows what he's brainwashed us into...
Angry Ape
I remember the good old minimalist days of electronic music videos where all you'd see was an amorphous digital blob spinning across a swiftly tilting background. Kingbastard's latest video seems to recall those abstract times, even though there's something much more complex with what Chris Weeks and Weird Fields are doing with [ downup ]. The flashing, subtle cues have a message tied somehow to the words explore, exploit, explode, before somewhere along the way you find yourself saying, "I love Big Brother."
Ogbetty
consuming collages depicting in the minds eye intergalactic voyages to far flung milky ways, gloriously wide screen in stature and vividly fulsome in texture. And while the obvious winner hand down here is ’bastardism’ - a lushly envisaged cosmic pit stop where shuffling statue-esque beats orbit amorously across swirling passages of soft psych ambient blissfulness - think Biosphere trading dialects more appreciable to the polar climes of Amon Duul and Jean Michel Jarre - a magnificent dreamscaping delight. Though that said our money is squarely on the monumental ’this is our tree and were not getting out of it’ - a desirable and engaging slice of achingly lonesome spectral beauty Losing Today
“Crystalism” is the most direct track, coming across like an aggressive, no nonsense Boards of Canada. Those distant synths that hallmark previous releases are intact here, layering themselves almost out of sync with the programmed beats, yet remaining cohesive. “Exit Strategy” is different again, employing thick mid-90’s beats over dripping melodies that slightly recall Wendy Carlos’ “Clockwork Orange” phase. Angry Ape
this five track EP is Solipsism’s most unified effort thus far. The album pivots with the beautifully arranged epilogue “Sun Up”, an ambient and emotional sprawl that leaves you with a warm sense of tranquility and profound motivation to hit the Solarism replay button. Sonic Frontiers
Solipsism again seamlessly blends ethereal synth swells with mechanical beat programming, to create a colliding electronic sound. The contrast between the wistfully melodic synths and the precise, robotic beats are a key component in this release’s sound. "At The Beach" is, by far and away, the best track on offer here. The beatwork seems off the pace from the gorgeous toybox chimes that plays an integral role on this track. Almost as if it is playing catch-up, the off-kilter pattern offers a timeless sound that induces the mood of an Ibizan sunset. Angry Ape
"Electricity Flows In Squares" has an nostaligic feel to it, advancing on the themes explored by artists such as Bola, Autechre and Bochum Welt. The pristine melodies posses a real other-worldly quality and are perfectly contrasted by the accomplished, mechanistic programming. It is an engaging listen that begs for an emotional response. Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep
Shoosh, the trio of Ed Drury, Neil Carlill and Craig Murphy, have a different approach to their music. More guitar-based than Cheju, Shoosh features a love-it-or-hate-it vocal style. Their track “Elastic Soil” is predominantly guitar-based but also features some soaring electronic textures underneath it all. Their second track, “Come in from the Cold,” is weirder still vocally and features shimmering electronic swirls and acoustic guitar. The first of their tracks sounds like Bowie meets Genesis P Orridge while the second is more like Dylan; both sound like drug-addled psychedelic folk - uniquely blissed out weird psychedelic folk excursions.
Igloomag
Shoosh are a different proposition altogether, combining the talents of Craig Murphy (synths, programming), multi-instrumentalist Ed Drury and former Delicatessen frontman Neil Carlill, who provides rather unique vocals. A starlit chime introduces “Elastic Soil” but will not prepare the listener for the intergalactic journey they are about to embark on. Murphy’s spectral drones provide the template for Drury to weave a beautiful Spanish guitar arrangement atop, while Carlill delivers his indecipherable yet strangely alluring vocals. Spell-bindingly inventive, shoosh construct an exclusive brand of ambient, space-folk.
Reverb Mag
Shoosh’s ghostly alluring ‘elastic soil’ is an off centred though numbingly beautiful work of ethereal psych-ambi-folk, pining celestial sheens, crooked and dust ridden stumbling acoustic flamenco strums serve as deliciously spectral montages underpinning the ether driven wandering vocal mantras - all at once hazy and disquieting though magically omnipresent the individual parts coalesce and caress like heavenly apparitions weaving in and out of view imagining Animal Collective centre stage in a celestial gunfight setting amid supernatural serenades sourced from Neil Young’s ‘eldorado’.
Losing Today
While other shoosh compositions come across like a space-age version of Pink Floyd, “Elastic Soil” finds them exploring a different plain altogether. Carlill’s vocals immediately pique the interest with its multi-tracked and warped out of shape tone. These are cushioned by a galaxy of spectral drones and superb Spanish guitar work to create this highly inventive piece of music.
Angry Ape
Shoosh's Elastic Soil features flamenco guitar and woozy, processed vocals stumbling around in a sweetly acrid haze. The Wire
Of more interest, I thought, was the music of Shoosh, a three piece group of Ed Drury (guitars), Neil Carlill (vocals and lyrics) and Craig Murphy (synth, programming). In 'Elastic Soil' they sound like an electronic version of Current 93, with a strong similarity in the vocal region. In 'Come In From The Cold' things turn even more down and moody, with sparse electronics, ending in total ambiance.
Vital Weekly
Shoosh is definitely more leftfield. Their two tracks explore a psychedelic world. ‘Elastic Soil’ begins with Spanish guitar before some warped vocals convey an evening of stoned abandon in Madrid. Leonard's Lair
The guitars are Iberian and the wooze is warm and writhes like animated spaghetti. It's quite a nifty little late night stoner track, phased vox n all, would be very much at home on any number of old Tyrannosaurus Rex albums. IS IT ANY GOOD? Yeah, it wont be featured on a chart show near you, but that's not the point, is it?
Unpeeled
Delicate, lonesome and hitherto monolithic these somnambulant drone-scapes swirl in frosted pirouette formations applying a stately courtship (none more so than ‘distant star‘).....Amid the showcase of glacial tides and sparsely drawn and effecting minimalist washes of lilting electronic symphonies we suggest you stop by at your first opportunity to sample the warming radiance of the playfully orbiting oscillations of the melting ’so long good friend’ - bit of a peach by our reckoning appealing to ’magnetic fields’ era Jarre and Vangelis fans alike. Losing Today
Solipsism
Losing Today
Swirling synths Picked guitar and then left. Soundscapes of uncomfortable beauty Pulses Dadaist in theory and practice Beat with no beat, you dig. The spoken word unspoken, the synthesis of nature formed and then de-con-struct-ed. Drone…and on. The sadness of a modulating tone and the pleasure in its repetition. Explain. SOUND!!! Beautiful in its scope, majestic in its sweep yet personal and claustrophobic. Names: Godspeed, you black Emperor. Explosions in the sky. Fennesz. Yet not quite. An album of outstanding music. That should be heard by all fellow travellers. Enjoy. I did.
Is This Music?
Weirdly wonderful art-rock by Craig Murphy. Challenging listening which won’t be to everyone’s taste
Music To Die For, 50 Top Tunes From Scotland.
As winter is fading away, giving way to new life and new experiences, so too is the overall tune of everything around us. There’s something about spring that brings out the best in people, so it’s suitable to have music that fits this positive aura. Shoosh specialize in a strange mix of acoustic guitar, distorted synths and hopeful ambiance....With these samples of what’s to come from this trio, I’m left hopefully waiting. Not to be blown away, because that’s not what Shoosh tries to accomplish, but rather to be taken on a journey. If they are able to evoke so much day dreaming with just two songs, I can only imagine what they will do with an hour of our time.
The Silent Ballet
Orpheum Circuit is a sweltering sheet of low flying beauty
Igloo Mag
"Shoosh is a trio of musicians, combining guitars and Americana-influenced songwriting with all manner of perplexing electronic programming and treatments. 'Snake Eyes' is a little like Sparklehorse or perhaps Benoit Pioulard - all distorted and twisted out of shape, with a squeaky, obfuscated vocal in place to remind you that you're listening to an actual song rather than the Fennesz-influenced soundscape it might otherwise resemble. The vocal will almost certainly take some getting used to in fact, but once you're accustomed to the sheer oddness of Neil Carlill's delivery (imagine a cross between Dose One and Mark E Smith) there's an awful lot to like about this record - in a world crammed with electronically treated songwriting efforts, Orpheum Circuit somehow manages to sound like it's really out there on its own." Boomkat
The adjectives sweeping, cinematic and symphonic come to the fore. This is music suited to the closing credits of a cathartic, two and a half hour movie epic. Doleful piano lines, dramatic synth washes and grandiose crescendos are the order of the day: like Eno’s Music For Films given the Cecil B DeMille treatment. The tracks have their individual flavours – the synthetic birds, church bells and crickets of “Dark Sun Rising”, for example – but the album works best as a kind of symphony in five movements. It’s music designed for looking from a hilltop and watching the shadows of clouds dancing across lush, rolling fields. Stirring and somehow reassuring at the same time. Music, Musings & Miscellany
This is downtempo, home-listening electronica, but with an edge. Lead track “Bastardism”, a collaboration with Kingbastard, is all steam-punk beats and abstract, cosmic synths. The ENV(itre) and Victer Manderline remixes are cooler, mellower affairs, whereas the charmingly named “Raped by a Woman” remix by Psychotronic is an uncomfortable, glitchy treatment. “Organicism” comes in two versions. The Pleq remix is the stronger, chugging and spluttering along like an eccentric piece of machinery. Music, Musings & Miscellany
The material's galaxial feel and trippy ambiance intensify when distorted voices echo across the limitless expanses of deep space, and nowhere is that epic pitch achieved more intensively than during the title piece which unspools over ten trance-inducing minutes (the sound is so huge, it reduces the voices that occasionally surface to indecipherable mumbles—but the work can be experienced just as easily on purely musical terms as an engrossing exercise in synthetic dronescaping. If anything, its unapologetically pure synth-based sound has more in common with ‘70s-styled ambient recordings (early Tangerine Dream, say) than a more current release where granular static and other noise might accompany the drones. That Alien Genome Project leaves such a strong impression is due in part to the forceful intensity of its presentation.
Textura
The album consists of drones, cosmic synth chords, and disembodied, distorted vocal samples. It has echoes of Kosmische Musik acts like (early) Tangerine Dream and Klaus Schultze as well as their spiritual descendants such as Pete Namlook. But there are equally nods to Stars of the Lid, Eno’s Apollo and Murcof’s Cosmos projects. The eight tracks unfold slowly. Some are short and fragile; others, like the title track, have a suitably cosmic grandeur. “Hybrid”, the closing section, has a slowed down echoing voice that has the rhythm of whale song, and sounds like the last, fading sounds of a dying civilization. It’s quite a spooky end to a seriously trippy suite of music.
Music Miscellany
ch.pm is the solo project of Craig Murphy, perhaps better known as one half of electro-psychedelic outfit Shoosh. ‘Alien Genome Project’, however, is like listening to an old-school ambient record, where melodies shift extremely slowly. Indeed, Tangerine Dream and Brian Eno would certainly approve of Murphy’s work. Leonard's Lair
Shoosh present a far folksier prospect, first with the digitised folk of 'Elastic Soil' - which avoids all that Tunng-style folktronica business thanks to its strained and unhinged vocal - and the rather lovely 'Come In From The Cold', another swirl of guitars, screeching synthesis and that strangely compelling, warped voice.
Boomkat
Weird Fields is a busy boy - it feels almost like he creates videos on weekly basis, judging from the amount of clips he's dished up in the last few months (last time it was a promo for Pestilence by Shoosh). This time Herb Recordings' Kingbastard is the subject: the track used is '[ d o w n u p ]' and the video has a series of flashing pictures, cryptic symbols and phrases. Weird Fields has probably filled the whole thing with subliminal messages too, so who knows what he's brainwashed us into...
Angry Ape
I remember the good old minimalist days of electronic music videos where all you'd see was an amorphous digital blob spinning across a swiftly tilting background. Kingbastard's latest video seems to recall those abstract times, even though there's something much more complex with what Chris Weeks and Weird Fields are doing with [ downup ]. The flashing, subtle cues have a message tied somehow to the words explore, exploit, explode, before somewhere along the way you find yourself saying, "I love Big Brother."
Ogbetty
consuming collages depicting in the minds eye intergalactic voyages to far flung milky ways, gloriously wide screen in stature and vividly fulsome in texture. And while the obvious winner hand down here is ’bastardism’ - a lushly envisaged cosmic pit stop where shuffling statue-esque beats orbit amorously across swirling passages of soft psych ambient blissfulness - think Biosphere trading dialects more appreciable to the polar climes of Amon Duul and Jean Michel Jarre - a magnificent dreamscaping delight. Though that said our money is squarely on the monumental ’this is our tree and were not getting out of it’ - a desirable and engaging slice of achingly lonesome spectral beauty Losing Today
“Crystalism” is the most direct track, coming across like an aggressive, no nonsense Boards of Canada. Those distant synths that hallmark previous releases are intact here, layering themselves almost out of sync with the programmed beats, yet remaining cohesive. “Exit Strategy” is different again, employing thick mid-90’s beats over dripping melodies that slightly recall Wendy Carlos’ “Clockwork Orange” phase. Angry Ape
this five track EP is Solipsism’s most unified effort thus far. The album pivots with the beautifully arranged epilogue “Sun Up”, an ambient and emotional sprawl that leaves you with a warm sense of tranquility and profound motivation to hit the Solarism replay button. Sonic Frontiers
Solipsism again seamlessly blends ethereal synth swells with mechanical beat programming, to create a colliding electronic sound. The contrast between the wistfully melodic synths and the precise, robotic beats are a key component in this release’s sound. "At The Beach" is, by far and away, the best track on offer here. The beatwork seems off the pace from the gorgeous toybox chimes that plays an integral role on this track. Almost as if it is playing catch-up, the off-kilter pattern offers a timeless sound that induces the mood of an Ibizan sunset. Angry Ape
"Electricity Flows In Squares" has an nostaligic feel to it, advancing on the themes explored by artists such as Bola, Autechre and Bochum Welt. The pristine melodies posses a real other-worldly quality and are perfectly contrasted by the accomplished, mechanistic programming. It is an engaging listen that begs for an emotional response. Boring Machines Disturbs Sleep
Shoosh, the trio of Ed Drury, Neil Carlill and Craig Murphy, have a different approach to their music. More guitar-based than Cheju, Shoosh features a love-it-or-hate-it vocal style. Their track “Elastic Soil” is predominantly guitar-based but also features some soaring electronic textures underneath it all. Their second track, “Come in from the Cold,” is weirder still vocally and features shimmering electronic swirls and acoustic guitar. The first of their tracks sounds like Bowie meets Genesis P Orridge while the second is more like Dylan; both sound like drug-addled psychedelic folk - uniquely blissed out weird psychedelic folk excursions.
Igloomag
Shoosh are a different proposition altogether, combining the talents of Craig Murphy (synths, programming), multi-instrumentalist Ed Drury and former Delicatessen frontman Neil Carlill, who provides rather unique vocals. A starlit chime introduces “Elastic Soil” but will not prepare the listener for the intergalactic journey they are about to embark on. Murphy’s spectral drones provide the template for Drury to weave a beautiful Spanish guitar arrangement atop, while Carlill delivers his indecipherable yet strangely alluring vocals. Spell-bindingly inventive, shoosh construct an exclusive brand of ambient, space-folk.
Reverb Mag
Shoosh’s ghostly alluring ‘elastic soil’ is an off centred though numbingly beautiful work of ethereal psych-ambi-folk, pining celestial sheens, crooked and dust ridden stumbling acoustic flamenco strums serve as deliciously spectral montages underpinning the ether driven wandering vocal mantras - all at once hazy and disquieting though magically omnipresent the individual parts coalesce and caress like heavenly apparitions weaving in and out of view imagining Animal Collective centre stage in a celestial gunfight setting amid supernatural serenades sourced from Neil Young’s ‘eldorado’.
Losing Today
While other shoosh compositions come across like a space-age version of Pink Floyd, “Elastic Soil” finds them exploring a different plain altogether. Carlill’s vocals immediately pique the interest with its multi-tracked and warped out of shape tone. These are cushioned by a galaxy of spectral drones and superb Spanish guitar work to create this highly inventive piece of music.
Angry Ape
Shoosh's Elastic Soil features flamenco guitar and woozy, processed vocals stumbling around in a sweetly acrid haze. The Wire
Of more interest, I thought, was the music of Shoosh, a three piece group of Ed Drury (guitars), Neil Carlill (vocals and lyrics) and Craig Murphy (synth, programming). In 'Elastic Soil' they sound like an electronic version of Current 93, with a strong similarity in the vocal region. In 'Come In From The Cold' things turn even more down and moody, with sparse electronics, ending in total ambiance.
Vital Weekly
Shoosh is definitely more leftfield. Their two tracks explore a psychedelic world. ‘Elastic Soil’ begins with Spanish guitar before some warped vocals convey an evening of stoned abandon in Madrid. Leonard's Lair
The guitars are Iberian and the wooze is warm and writhes like animated spaghetti. It's quite a nifty little late night stoner track, phased vox n all, would be very much at home on any number of old Tyrannosaurus Rex albums. IS IT ANY GOOD? Yeah, it wont be featured on a chart show near you, but that's not the point, is it?
Unpeeled
Delicate, lonesome and hitherto monolithic these somnambulant drone-scapes swirl in frosted pirouette formations applying a stately courtship (none more so than ‘distant star‘).....Amid the showcase of glacial tides and sparsely drawn and effecting minimalist washes of lilting electronic symphonies we suggest you stop by at your first opportunity to sample the warming radiance of the playfully orbiting oscillations of the melting ’so long good friend’ - bit of a peach by our reckoning appealing to ’magnetic fields’ era Jarre and Vangelis fans alike. Losing Today
Solipsism
Tuesday 10 November 2009
Wednesday 28 October 2009
Thursday 15 October 2009
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