The long-awaited but nonetheless unexpected sequel to one of the most widely beloved documents of improvised music is finally here in the form of Supersédure 2, the first material from field recordist Éric La Casa and percussionist Seijiro Murayama since the original Supersedure in 2009 (I’m not sure of the significance of the presence/lack of the accented E, if any). The two seasoned sound artists’ collaborative formula remains largely the same for this formidable follow-up, though the sonic milieus captured, transformed, and occupied seem to lean more toward interiors than exteriors. Fourteen years is a long time, but La Casa looks even further back in time to assemble the arsenal of recordings he wields, with some of them being unearthed from as early as 2003. Recurring elements include echoing footsteps, digital appliance tones (barcode-scanner chirps, forklift backup beeps, mouse clicks), and more. Murayama is as sparing and precise as ever in his contributions, often deliberately mimicking the metronomic intervals of the aforementioned motifs. The first section of Part I is an immediate and representative introduction or (re-introduction for those already familiar) to the duo’s dynamic, with precise snare cracks cutting through and building tension between intermittent unfoldings of industrial environments like auditory pop-up pages, while the third reverses spatial trajectory to transform wide-open warehouse spaces into intimate tabletop operations, helped along by muted stick rolls. Yes, the overall focus is definitely on indoor dramas, but Supersédure 2‘s most affecting moment occurs at the end of Part II when the action abruptly moves outside, concluding the suite with a birdsong/snare duet that I can’t stop thinking about. Even after several listens I’m still extremely excited about—and grateful for—this wonderful release.

Even if you haven’t yet heard the first release by B33N, it should come as no surprise that Seamus Williams once collaborated with New England neighbors Staubitz and Waterhouse. I bring this up because the same flavor of masticated mundanity that so enthralled me when I first heard “Pickup for Mark” on the Pawtucket duo’s first double-A 7” emerges right off the bat in this debut collaborative release from Williams (of TVE and Ayurvedic fame) and fellow anti-music apostle Liam Kramer-White (check out excellent solo documents Every Moment Worldwide and this year’s For Every Moment Upon Which It Was, as well as LOL with Arkm Foam as LMFAO), though the overall effect is markedly different. The pragmatically named project—Kramer-White: “It’s called Been [sic] because it’s something we’ve been working on”—sees the two artists sharing recording and editing duties, the former and quite possibly the latter accomplished using mobile phones. Electroacoustic manipulations are applied sparingly, usually adding only minimal wrinkles or tinctures to a mostly intact soundscape rather than complete restructurings. The single 3”-length piece that comprises Whole Kernel Niblets is wrapped in a queasy plastic sheen, evoked by both diegetic sounds from food packaging and shopping carts and the distinctive digital slur of gutted spectra and bitrate reduction. Though largely absent of explicit human presence, it at once captures and replicates the rhythmic, numbing tedium that occupies a much more significant portion of everyday life than many would care to admit, as well as the fleeting bursts of happiness and horror that hide in the most inconsequential-seeming of moments.

Only one of several multi-artist entries in the latest Buried in slag and debris. batch (which also includes a collaboration between label alum dang. and Howard Stelzer and a sprawling 2xCS faceoff between household names Knurl and ARTBREAKHOTEL), this inspired pairing of two newer voices in minimal analog noise takes a less contrastive curatorial approach than the Slow Blink / Stomachache matchup reviewed last week, instead featuring artists with similar but nonetheless distinct sounds. Toronto-based project Murmur (Ross Henteleff) has been around since at least 2021, self-releasing scuzzy low-profile music on digital platforms and DIY physical media, but even 2022’s excellent Anecdotes and this year’s untitled CD-R also seem like stops along the road to the four short pieces that comprise the A side of Balcony. Henteleff dexterously mines both the caustic and the clement textures of a tape-centric setup: the rough-hewn second cut wields the former; the pensive third the latter; and the fourth both at once, stitching together sandpaper loop tendrils as an almost tender undercurrent swells. Not much information about Fowl (Ben Symonds) is available yet, but the side speaks for itself. These tracks seem scraped from an even grimier undercarriage than the previous four, hissing and sputtering like an off-brand infernal machine. They lean toward stagnancy in a way I really enjoy, especially the third, in which paranoid clunks and creeping feedback inflect the filmy stream draining from a rusted sonic spigot. The aesthetic comradery between both projects makes for a cohesion rare among splits; Fossils’ and Darksmith’s Million Year Spree comes to mind as another example (that also serves as a pretty good RIYL).

Visionary hermits hailing from Chattanooga and Minneapolis, respectively, pair up for this dusty split C42 on the latter’s new imprint Hectare. (Side note: shout out to Stomachache for always keeping me stocked with copies of his new releases; 2021’s Good Machine cassette and this year’s Capacity Limit / Compressor lathe 7″ are also great and well worth checking out.) I had never heard of Amanda Haswell’s Slow Blink project before now, but consider my ears opened because her contribution, the side-spanning “Axis Tilt,” is a tremendous feat. Longing loops spool up haunting laments that breathe and grow instead of decaying away, letting more and more light in as the piece progresses—dissonance becomes harmony, tension dissolves into catharsis. The piano-led second half that melts into bliss like frost on a sun-drenched window is so affecting that listening to it aloud alters the very essence of the space you’re in. On the moodier flip, Stomachache delivers a pensive suite of his distinct spin on stripped-down, subdued analog noise: “Zone” turns the equipment-strewn tabletop into a miniature dramatic stage production with narrative arcs of shifty stumble and rickety rumble; cryptic whispers haunt the shadowed crawlspaces of “Finally Secret.” Both artists, each having been active for the better part of a decade, are at the top of their game here; even with somewhat disparate (though complementary) approaches and atmospheres, this tape offers up some of the best tape music I have heard in recent years.

Even before “hyperreality” is explicitly invoked in “Heart-Shaped Reality,” Baudrillard was already brought to mind by the overloaded maxi-collages of The End. Here is a grotesque, ouroboric cultural semiotics, a festering mass of neon signs abstracted to such a degree that they both consume and signify only themselves; Burroughs’ cut-up polemic also lurks behind the scenes, but there are no accidental premonitions or moments of serendipitous sublimity to be found, only the death spiral of the modern era to which we are already subjected each and every day. Though venerable multimedia project I Cut People doesn’t exactly deal in obscurities when it comes to source material—within the first ten or so minutes you’ll hear, among other things, such deep cuts as “Yeah,” “Everybody Hurts,” “Sexy and I Know It,” “Everybody Wants to Rule the World,” and “Gangnam Style”—and yet the double whammy of pseudo-narrative splicing and abstract textural play is anything but passé. “Thirty Percent” is an especially harrowing cut that directly engages with the recent escalation of the Palestinian genocide; “HypeRealove” maps the horrors of consumer AI. This is dense, mile-a-minute, often truly disturbing stuff, but it’s usually funny, in a ruthless and absurd and desperate kind of way (see “The End”). There are also times when it is genuinely pretty: the coda of “Out of Existence” with Buttress O’Kneel pairs the Scientist’s monologue in Bad Boy Bubby with the strums of The Velvet Underground’s “Heroin,” and “calc( hurt x 2 )” delivers a haunting and somehow tender threnody for the extinction event just witnessed (experienced). “People: they tend to collapse in on themselves.”

“I’m on a budget right now, but using the skills I have to continue to make music.” So goes Ellie Kokoro’s humble introduction to their newest release on nebulous in-house netlabel Wouldn’t Know (this quote is followed by a much lengthier discussion of audio quality standards and mastering techniques—long story short, the artist’s production paradigm leans minimal and laissez-faire, and stands in opposition to the still-snowballing loudness wars). The music comprising Curious Cryptids itself possesses plenty of humility as well, taking the form of six ragtime-influenced piano improvisations recorded outside at a gazebo in Sewickley, PA. Kokoro is clearly a talented and adventurous pianist, but neither virtuosity nor subversion are the focus here; each piece is a straightforward and often danceable bit of musical impressionism, no more and no less. Simply recorded with a smartphone, the rolling melodies and off-beat accents are frequently joined by the surrounding ambient soundscape of the park—birds chirp, leaves and twigs tumble in the wind, cars on nearby roads breeze by at audibly relaxed velocities—but it feels more incidental than intentional, i.e., I don’t hear the same co-emphasis on contribution and observance that characterizes the ostensibly comparable work of Áine O’Dwyer, Nick Keeling, or Natalia Beylis. Rather, the “point” of Curious Cryptids is purely that it is music that just happens to have been performed in a particular place, which ironically makes the unexpected moments of textural harmony all the more serendipitous. I am a big fan of Kokoro’s aesthetic credo, or perhaps the lack thereof… where else could you hear a track titled “Spitroasted by Mothman and Bigfoot” that sounds this cute?

Going into Bituminous Concrete Curb Detail I did not expect the level of fidelity and sound design that immediately and loudly makes itself known in distortion-wracked opener “Not to Scale” and remains, in various forms, throughout the remaining six tracks. I’ll admit I had expectations based on what I have previously heard on Ayurvedic, a small batch label initially launched by Seamus Williams to release his first recordings as TVE, which all seemed to worship the bottommost dregs of analog tape noise. And that was before I knew that the material for  fellow Worcester, MA resident Mickey O’Hara’s latest on the imprint was produced via a custom framework in SuperCollider. But it’s not that Curb Detail doesn’t belong on the venerable imprint, something that “14” Gravel Base,” one of two lengthier pieces, wastes no time in asserting with its expansive soundscape that could easily pass as scuttling basement concrète punctuated by fraught yawns of audible emptiness. Both the digital toolbelt and the CD-R format make room for a little less dust and a little more detail, and O’Hara takes full advantage of this with each enthralling composition; this is a well-structured and consistently engaging album. Even as it proceeds at a rather reticent pace there are always moments of surprise: the throttled, writhing textures of “Hey (Slab)” evoke those of a certain power electronics project, “330 Crickets” powers up into full-on glitch mode, and I swear those are humans making some of those sounds in “Musty Sheet no. c7.0.” There’s something for everyone, clearly, but in the interest of recommendation, fans of Christian Mirande, Mysterious House, or some of the more electronics-heavy Vitrine releases will definitely feel right at home. The more I play this one the more it’s shaping up to be a favorite of the whole year.

Ayurvedic orders are placed/fulfilled via email: seamusrwilliams@gmail.com.

Selving, the latest and perhaps greatest solo project from Dan Williams (a.k.a. Swarm Survival; member of Pyramid Dust, Culled, Ghoul’s Teeth, Rust Belt), first torched tape with 2021’s appropriately titled Willed Into Existence on the artist’s own imprint Structures Without Purpose. Though there was already plenty of cut-up DNA woven into the two mono-heavy blasts of that C20, those strands have grown like hungry vines through the thick analog churn of Guerrilla Bamboozlement Campaign and now thrive in the loamy ruins of Miniscula, cinch-amputating slabs of surging pedal-noise into jagged chunks with stretches of humid dead air in between. I hope I get to see a live set someday, because this is the kind of stuff that’s better witnessed than simply heard; every rumble and roar in “Bizarre Animalcule” sounds forced from a maxed-out effects chain by ruthless killswitch compressions—Caustic Pulse Rupture?—and one can almost see the knobs twisting through the soupy direct-action smog of “Muling.” There’s a (frequent) time and (large) place for the high-fidelity, stereo-lush shrapnel storms of audiophilic surgeons like T.E.F, Negation, Marion, and others, but I’m just as often in the mood for this blunt-nosed approach that is thriving in underground hotspots around the States and across the globe, a trend with aspects both fresh and classic that Fusty has been faithfully chronicling with many of these inspired recent tape releases. Miniscula has all the colorful density and textural eclecticism of Bamboozlement (one of my most played tapes in the box of noise-bags that lives right next to the deck), but here Williams also introduces a well-humored volatility into the mix, cross-contaminating currents and injecting left-field sample breaks with inflammatory irreverence. My sole complaint is that it’s too damn short.

Last time I reviewed an Everyday Samething release (Hydra’s Your Name), I discussed how the enigmatic imprint’s unique approach to tangible editions responds to “a point in time when physical music is much more ritual than utility to most.” That dialogue is only more relevant in the case of the newest entry in their catalog: Birdbath I, a brief bit of thoroughly DIY sound art by an unknown artist pressed as an “extremely limited” run of four business cards with the album artwork on the front and a QR code linking to a youtube upload of the music on the back, priced at a cool hundred quid each. By design, there is quite literally no incentive to own one of these objects other than the fact that only a handful were or will be made; they do not include a code for lossless download, nor is the youtube video solely accessible via the QR.

It’s a rarity parody that’s both amusing and incisive. Though scarcity in the underground music community is at its root simply a financial and logistical necessity, it has become some sort of benchmark for “legitimate” ownership and is now often intentional (read: artificial), an evolution with its bleakest results manifesting as limited digital NFT releases such as those distributed by Nina Protocol. Made-to-order imprints like Matching Head and experimental prank editions like those of Everyday Samething are deliberately dug potholes in that all-too-smooth road into the cancerous depths of capitalism—and the satirical aspect of Birdbath I lets us muse on what might be playing over the speakers in that cursed clown-car. The answer? Subliminal propaganda mutterings, dictaphone smear, sabotaged mass-media broadcasts, the best and brightest of this generation’s elevator music. A funereal radio play to score the most boring apocalypse imaginable. Hard to describe how desolate the sixth untitled section is: static-cracked sounds of idly tapped fingers and shuffled decks of cards, the dried-out signifieds of human presence passively decapitated from their referents. The material, which was anonymously submitted with next to no context other than the request for the unusual delivery method, could not be better aligned with it. Twenty-five minutes of that elusive superposition of forbidden revelation and utter uselessness that seems to be the only relevant art for our times… I will not rest until I own all four copies.

Pentiments’ first CD release is appropriately one with a radical focus on digital media both physical and disembodied, an aesthetic purview that should come as no surprise to followers of LA-based sound researcher Connor Camburn, whose sparse discography under his own name and as Litüus on Careful Catalog, Chained Library, and other imprints comprises some of the most forward-thinking computer music of the past few decades. It would be difficult to say anything about 00U0U_akhnQkunEcw_0CI0pI_600x450 that hasn’t already been covered in the evocative (if a bit verbose) liner notes, so I’ll aim to build on them instead, especially the excellent phrase “the incidental grandeur of malfunction.” Here Camburn codes, composes, and cointegrates an entirely new musical language based in data output both intentional and erroneous, uncovering obscure alien logics in the interactions between unpredictable systems of tones and textures. The ensuing musical works manifest in a variety of forms; some are kinetic (the seething, hyperactive noise arrays of “01082016”), others lethargic (“08112020” / “08292021” and their slow-paced flow of decaying pulses that ring both inquisitive and sorrowful in turn), but all display a disconcerting amount of emotional sentience. Whether that’s simply the result of nothingness mirroring the preoccupations of the observer or the subtle agency of some sort of ghost in the machine is up for debate, but the latter possibility is difficult to ignore when confronted with something as profoundly arresting as the penultimate “08242021,” a piece that just seems too sensible, too organic to have been produced by a passive algorithm. To return to the introductory words, 00U0U_akhnQkunEcw_0CI0pI_600x450 is billed as “a stark and laconic argument against the oncoming ‘technological singularity’,” and it succeeds—these are the sounds of humanity being boxed up in modular caskets by silicon caretakers of our own making.