From the 1950s, Masaaki Takano (1927-2007) worked as a freelance "sound planner," mainly creating sound effects for stage productions. In the mid-1980s he began performances called "Sound Play" where he would perform on his own self-created sound instruments and his collection of ethnic instruments. Growing out of his work with sound effects, he became obsessed with the recording of natural sounds from the 1970s onwards, and this album "Shizukutachi" is a record of a high-quality recording of water droplets that he created in the studio using his own self-created suikinchiku system. This reissue recreates the original LP, using special paper to create beautiful packaging and duplicating the original, ultra-transparent vinyl. The reissue includes newly penned, detailed liner notes by Tomotaro Kaneko (owner of the Japanese Art Sound Archive).

ECM artist Arild Anderson wraps his double bass to Clive Bell’s intoxicating Asian woodwind, punctuated by Mark Wastell’s sparing percussion in their ‘Tales Of Hackney’ improvisation for Confront’s Core Series. The resulting 50 minute work, in 9 parts, was extracted from a 10 hour recording session in the titular East London district, late summer 2017. It was edited, mixed and mastered by Rupert Clervaux with Mark Wastell, who also handled production. From the original session, they divine a series of hard-to-define scenarios as enchanting and heady as a dusky stroll thru Hackney, reflecting a synaesthetic conflux of phosphorescent light and drifting smells, flowing like its mosaic of multi-purpose dwellings riddled and teeming with life, occasionally implying a noirish, even voyeuristic stealth in its more haunted, furtive moments, while others connote a spangled wooziness, and yet more absorb and speak to an idea of London as a humid melting pot, inarguably linked to the Far East as much as downtown NYC, but solipsistically revolving its own dream. (Boomkat) Arild Andersen : double bass / electronicsClive Bell : khene (thai mouth organ) / shakuhachi / pi saw (thai flute) / shinobueMark Wastell : percussion / shruti box

Tom Jackson : clarinetDaniel Thompson : guitar

Pre-order: Ariving late Dec / Early Jan Astounding, long-overdue repress of Art Into Life's essential X5CD survey of Anne Gillis  French artist Manon Anne Gillis began creating everyday yet theatrical sound works and performances in the early 1980s. This is the first archival collection of her work, covering her earliest pieces from 1983 under the name Devil’s Picnic up to her installation and exhibition recordings from 2005. This five-CD box set includes all the LP and CD albums released on (CRI)2, DMA2, and Rangehen; her only collaboration with another artist—a 7-inch single with her close associate G.X. Jupitter-Larsen; her compilation contributions up to 1999 (excluding a few whose original masters have been lost); and eleven previously unreleased pieces appearing here for the first time. A dense compilation filled with the imagery of beautiful isolation.

2 × CDLimited to 500 copies worldwideHand-made sleeve, each copy unique Returning with what might just be their most ambitious release to date, Vlek wades deep into the waters of historical Minimalism and delivers an astounding new rendering of Philip Glass’ monumental debut opera from 1976, ‘Einstein on the Beach’, elegantly reconfigured and performed by Suzanne Vega, Collegium Vocale Gent, and The Ictus Ensemble, capturing a site-sensitive” installation of the work from 2022, in the hands of these visionary artists and ensembles this towering historical works comes alive within profound new dimensions.

Lance Austin Olsen - amplified copper plate, shruti box, guitar, bamboo flute, found tapes, amplified objectsErin Cunes - voiceDan Godlovitch - octatrack sampler credits released April 13, 2025Score and mix by Lance Austin OlsenMastered by alan Jones at Laminal AudioCover image by Lance austin OlsenDesign by Matthew BrandiProduced by Mark Wastell"Lance Austin Olsen's "Death in the Urban Jungle" is a singular electroacoustic composition that blends scored structure with improvisational energy across one extended track. Working with a highly tactile set of materials-amplified copper plate, shruti box, bamboo flute, guitar, and found tapes-Olsen layers physical sound with the haunting voice of Erin Cunes and the digital manipulation of Dan Godlovitch's Octatrack sampler. The result is an immersive piece that unfolds slowly and deliberately, marked by long stretches of near-silence punctuated by sudden sonic intrusions. Silence here is not absence, but a charged space that heightens every gesture and breath. From resonance to rupture, the composition explores decay, tension, and transformation, evoking the slow erosion of the self within the constructed chaos of urban life. Listeners are advised to use headphones to fully engage with the nuanced depth of this stark and poetic work." (Squidco)

Michael Pisaro-Liu - electric guitar (track 2)Michael Francis Duch - double bass Within (2) / Appearance (2) by Michael Pisaro-Liu presents a contemplative exploration of duration and silence, foregrounding gradual transformation. These extended works for guitar and double bass, created with Michael Francis Duch, reward patient listening and engage with resonance and subtlety over spectacle. Within (2) / Appearance (2) marks a further evolution in Michael Pisaro-Liu's practice, threading together patience and attentiveness across two ambitious compositions. Joined by Michael Francis Duch on double bass, Pisaro-Liu sculpts each movement with an acute sensitivity to timbre and pause, offering listeners a space where minute changes gain emotional gravity. “Within (2)” focuses on solo instrument resonance, shaping an hour-long meditation on overtones and presence, while “Appearance (2)” draws out conversational interplay, shaping an austere yet deeply human dialogue between guitar and bass. The work unfolds gradually, each sonic gesture a deliberate event amidst an unhurried progression. These pieces reaffirm Pisaro-Liu’s place within the tradition of Wandelweiser and reductionist composition, yet they remain uniquely singular—quietly radical and emotionally resonant, reaching those drawn to listening as meditation and as an evolving act of discovery.

Henry Dagg is a composer, improvisor, sound sculptor and builder of experimental musical instruments who formerly worked as a sound engineer for the BBC. His works include the Sharpsichord, a pin barrel harp commissioned for the English Folk Dance and Song Society, and a pair of steel sculptural musical gates for Rochester Independent College.“What he’s doing is a very serious body of work. Henry’s not an ordinary commercial artist/musician; he seeks perfection, and he’ll get it at any cost.”— Brian Pain, Rochester Independent CollegeEvan Parker improvises on the tenor and soprano saxophone, and has performed live and recorded extensively across the UK and internationally. He has pioneered or substantially expanded an array of extended techniques for the saxophone.“The UK’s greatest exponent of free jazz.”— Mike Hobart, Financial TimesHenry and Evan improvised together for the first time as part of the Free Range series in Canterbury, Kent, on December 2, 2021. For the performance, Evan played soprano saxophone, and Henry developed a new electronic instrument called the Stage Cage, to both process Evan’s live sound as well as generate its own sounds.The Stage Cage includes four valve test-oscillators, a pair of ring modulators, frequency shifter, chromatic zither, and a variable tape delay system (consisting of two quarter-inch tape machines, eight feet apart – the first machine records, and the tape runs past moveable playback heads to the second machine, allowing several replays). Henry's main performance interface is a ‘dynamic router’: a five-key controller, which is the bridge between most of the components of the Stage Cage.Towards the end of the performance, the tape machines were stopped, their reels reversed and set to play: the improvisation from then on was overlaid by a reverse reproduction of what Henry and Evan had already been performing, with the reverse recording itself also being subjected to various treatments.The live recording was subsequently developed by Henry for this 56 minute album. Evan notes in the accompanying booklet interview: “I would say it will sound better now, because of the post-production work that Henry’s done, using the live recording as – basically – tracks to be part of a new mix, a new project, which obviously overlaps hugely with what we did in the room, but it should be more detailed and better balanced in certain parts. Some post-production decisions that technology makes possible, where they led to improvements, Henry used those possibilities. It should be better than being at the event …”For the CD and digital release, the recording has been mastered by Adam Skeaping, and a conversation between Henry, Evan and performance artist Karen Christopher is included in a 20 page booklet.______________________________________________________“This 56-minute improvisation demonstrates the fearless sonic imagination of both Parker and Dagg, always searching for unchartered territories and with great attention to detail and a totally free and unpredictable spirit, but their own way of suggesting a cohesive and coherent improvisation. Its arresting atmosphere visits abstract musique concrète, otherworldly, deep-space ambient journeys, and a careful but sometimes subversive and kaleidoscopic investigation of the soprano sax tones and overtones, live and processed ones.”— Salt Peanuts, on THEN THROUGH NOW______________________________________________________Music by Henry Dagg and Evan ParkerOriginal recording by RouteStockProduction by Henry DaggMastered by Adam Skeaping Photographs by RouteStockDesign by David Caines Gatefold sleeve, with 20 page bookletOriginal live recording: Fruitworks/Fond Coffee, Jewry Lane, Canterbury, as part of the Free Range series, December 2, 2021. freerangecanterbury.orgAlbum launch event & benefit for the venue:The Hot Tin, Faversham: November 20, 2022

Live Knots, Oren Ambarchi’s first release for PAN, presents two live realizations of ‘Knots’, the epic centrepiece of his Audience of One (Touch, 2012) release. Built on the interplay between Ambarchi’s swirling, guitar harmonics and the metronomic pulse and shifting accents of Joe Talia’s DeJohnette-esque drumming, the piece merges the organic push and pull of free improvisation with an overarching compositional framework. ‘Tokyo Knots’ presents the complete recording of a duo performance of the piece by Ambarchi and Talia recorded at Tokyo’s legendary SuperDeluxe in March 2013. The performance builds gently on the foundation of Talia’s insistent ride cymbal and the shifting tonal bed of Ambarchi’s rich overtone-drenched guitar, eventually going into a free rock free fall of buzzsaw harmonics and crashing drums. From within the maelstrom, Talia picks up a pulsing motorik rhythm that leads the piece back to where it began, with the addition of the shuddering, elastic tones of a hand-played spring reverb unit. ‘Krakow Knots’, recorded live at Unsound Festival in Krakow in 2013, works with the same basic structure but stretches it out to nearly twice the length and adds strings played by the Sinfonietta Cracovia, led by Eyvind Kang on viola. The strings expand the piece’s textural range with lush chordal blocks, uneasy dissonances and occasional Ligeti-esque swarms of micro-activity, the swelling string tones intensifying the ecstatic nature of the piece as it moves towards its mid-point crescendo in which Ambarchi unleashes a particularly malicious continuum of stuttering harmonic fuzz. The strings then enter with a series of swelling chords, announcing the piece’s final movement, and reaffirming the uniqueness of the tonal and compositional language that Ambarchi has patiently developed over the last two decades, in which the influence of post-minimal composers such as Alvin Curran, Gavin Bryars and David Behrman can be felt alongside the inspiration of raw free jazz, harsh noise and academic psychoacoustics. The final moments of the performance pit Talia and Crys Cole’s amplified objects and spring reverb textures against a field of gently gliding string glissandi before the audience erupts in much-deserved applause. – Francis Plagne

"Two improvisations on piano & tenor saxophone, one in concert and the other before the audience arrived, recorded at the Bimhuis in Amsterdam in 2006. The sleeve design is derived from work by the late Tomas Schmit whose work is much loved by both MM and EP."-

This recording from the earlier years of Cafe Oto documents the impossible pairing of four contemporary giants. Its one of those miraculous one off groupings that reminds us why the venue opened in the first place.’ “The magic of the first minutes – an alto solo by Joe McPhee of true purity – soft-spoken, masterful and accomplished – brought back to mind the blissful Coleman/Haden duet last year at the Royal Festival Hall. ‘Ornette gave me freedom to move in a certain way,’ said McPhee. He searched hesitantly and carefully for his words, all the more surprising from such an articulate musical (or, as he might say ‘muse-ical’) practitioner and campaigner. Coleman’s 80th birthday coincided with McPhee’s stint at Cafe Oto. McPhee and his co-musicians delivered an intense performance which was both creative and restrained. With Evan Parker ‘s tenor in tow – a collaboration going back to the late 70s – and Lol Coxhill, sitting with head bowed intently, a soprano master – it could have gone anywhere, yet they worked off each other, often in the higher registers, building up almost bird-call like interactions and trills. Earlier, Chris Corsano‘s drumming presented a dense bedrock for McPhee to play against, and his solo spell was a crisp exercise in sonic curiosity. McPhee picked up his soprano mid-way through the second set, heightening the lyricism of the three saxophones. Then, being a devotee of Don Cherry, he switched to pocket trumpet, allowing him to interject, and punctuate the concentrated sound layers built up by the quartet, and lead the music out through a different door”- Geoff Winston (londonjazznews.com) Recorded 10th March 2010, this is also a document of the only time Lol Coxhill and Joe Mcphee shared the stage. The recording is a little rough, but hey, so was your birth! Limited to 500 copies packaged in mini gatefold sleeve.

2023 repress of the OTOROKU re-issue of the legendary English free improvisation LP 'The Topography of The Lungs' by Evan Parker, Derek Bailey and Han Bennink. This was Evan Parker’s first recording as a "leader" and was the first release on Incus, the label Parker founded with guitarist Derek Bailey and drummer Tony Oxley. This re-issue has been produced from an original vinyl pressing from Evan's archives - carefully transcribed and restored by Andreas [LUPO] Lubich at Calyx in Berlin and features the original liner notes from Parker along with updated notes penned in 2014. "To talk further of the music we play is difficult. It’s criteria for success exist, but are elusive and indefinable beyond the intuitive level. We operate without rules (pre-composed material) or well-defined code of behaviour (fixed tempi, tonalities, serial structures etc.), and yet are able to distinguish success from failure." - From Evan Parker’s original liner notes (1970) This pressing of The Topography of The Lungs comes in a limited edition of 500 copies.

Evan Parker's monumental LP of solo soprano saxophone improvisations, recorded direct-cut and issued by Incus in 1978. Lovingly reissued by Treader — the CD is from PSI — using the original stampers, in a gorgeous hand-assembled sleeve, with glossy front and matt back, flaps out. Unmissable. ‘Parker uses rapid tonguing techniques and circular breathing to create a sound all his own, marked by the simultaneous intonation of multiple notes. One hears a note as well as all the residual tones around it; each breath ends up sounding like a battle between the different registers of the horn. At various times, Parker’s saxophone sounds like dolphin speech, electronic tape squeals, or human murmurs; namely, anything but what it actually is. His language on the instrument is essential listening for anyone interested in acoustic experimental music’ (AllMusic). ‘Eight years after Topography Of The Lungs, and two years after his Saxophone Solos, Monoceros was the most muscular statement of Evan Parker’s solo saxophone muse. Superbly recorded, it seemed to place the listener within the chaotic air flows of the saxophone’s own tubing. Philip Clark said: ‘Parker’s dialogue with the saxophone throws up so much that is unexpected, and indeed unknowable, that the problem he faces is how to keep pace with his own invention’’ (The Wire, Best Albums Of The Year).

Concert recordings from the Contemporary Arts Center New Orleans and the Seattle Asian Arts Museum from the trio of Evan Parker (sax), Alexander von Schlippenbach (piano) and Paul Lytton (percussion), 2 CDs of stunning and surprising improv from three masters of the form.

Double Bass – Peter Kowald Layout – Jost Gebers Liner Notes – Klaus Kürvers Liner Notes [Translation] – Isabel Seeberg, Paul Lytton Mastered By – Jonas Bergler Percussion [Percussion Instruments] – Paul Lovens Photography By – Dagmar Gebers Photography By [Front] – Paul Lovens Piano – Alexander Von Schlippenbach Producer – Jost Gebers Recorded By – Jost Gebers Soprano Saxophone, Tenor Saxophone – Evan Parker

■NB the content of the LP and CD versions is not identical.■The LP includes four pieces: three selected from the original exhibition pieces by Art into Life, and one new piece (“Dialogue”) by Hirose that was not included in the exhibition. “Dialogue” only appears on this LP version.The CD includes all of the original pieces from the exhibition. The vinyl comes with DL code that has all CD tracks. The Kiyosato Museum of Contemporary Art was located in Kiyosato, Yamanashi prefecture from 1990 to 2014. It was a private art museum with a permanent exhibit based on a collection of unrivalled scale. The museum also collected and mounted exhibitions on the work of radical contemporary composers, including John Cage. The museum’s primary informant on music was sound designer Yutaka Hirose, one of the pioneers of Japan’s environmental music (kankyō ongaku) movement in the 1980s. In 1992, the museum mounted a John Cage Memorial exhibition, and this release showcases Hirose’s work on the overall exhibition design and the creation of the sounds that were played in the museum during the exhibition, through a re-edit and reissue of the sound materials.The sound materials that Hirose created for the exhibition environment were only ever distributed on CDr to members of the curatorial team so this is their first formal release. Hirose’s work for the exhibition was radical in its use of musique concrète and collages of noise and everyday sounds, and in his homage to Cage’s methods, these pieces represent a distinct departure from his normal approach at the time.The A4 booklet includes texts about the exhibition by members of the team, Hirose’s own description of the pieces, and photographs of the exhibition. (Text in Japanese and English).