Experimental
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One of my more embarrassing radio moments came in the early 1990s, as I began to develop an interest in the history of experimental music. Not having paid sufficient attention in French class, I was forever mispronouncing words containing the language’s various accents: l’accent aigu, l’accent grave, etc. This meant that the enthusiasm with which…
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Artists who produce instrumental music – or to put it more precisely, music that doesn’t feature vocals – are often asked how they decide on titles. At the risk of sounding elitist, that always struck me as one of the dumber questions in music journalism. Sure, not all music lends itself naturally to a pithy…
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French artist Sylvain Milliot will release his first album under the name Véhicule on Friday. Le Temps du Chien is a detailed, carefully assembled combination of acoustic and electronic sounds. Neither purely ambient nor new classical, it offers the listenability of the former and the refinement of the latter. It sounds too advanced to be…
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It is entirely unfair to begin a review of this new self-titled Dark Star Safari recording with a reference to David Sylvian. He has nothing to do with the project, and members Jan Bang, Erik Honoré, Eivind Aarset and Samuel Rohrer are all serious, accomplished musicians whose work deserves consideration in its own right. Still,…
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The promotional material accompanying this new 27-minute work, improbably titled “Side A/B,” describes partners Stuart Chalmers and Neil Campbell as “two old Yorkshire-based chaps.” It is a standard bit of British humility. Chalmers is an accomplished, well-known found-sound artist, while Campbell has earned international accolades as a post-punk innovator and prolific artist in the years…
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We are told that Ingar Zach’s latest is significant for two reasons. After exploring a variety of percussion instruments and developing a unique personal style, Floating Layer Cake is described in its notes as the “culmination of his percussion practice.” The album also marks a new beginning. For the first time, the 47-year-old Norwegian has…
The Moderns 