| | Marta Forsberg - Sjunger För Varandra | Split between pieces written for voice and field recordings, Swedish composer Marta Forsberg returns to her native Härnösand for Sjunger För Varandra, originally a commission from the northern Swedish town where the recordings took place. The elegant release is spread over four parts, sandwiched between an intro and outro, coming in at a mere 17 minutes. Without much prior knowledge of the tunnel where the performances were captured, the four central parts appear to have been divided equally between composition and recorded ephemera. It is not immediately clear what significance the tunnel has for Forsberg, but the inclusion of her brother as the sole vocal performer surely speaks to the familial significance of returning home for Sjunger För Varandra, which translates, I am told, to "Singing for Each Other." The gerundive is instructive here, for it places the emphasis on the act or performative dimension of the pieces, rather than hinting at anything like a fixed entity or score.
|
|
|
|
| | Liza Lim - Annunciation Triptych | Here’s a pro package from Kairos, which you’d expect as an esteemed classical label, with a CD digipak featuring an extensive booklet neatly fixed inside. The Australian composer Lim presents, yes, three pieces here: ‘Sappho/Bioluminescence’, ‘Mary/Transcendence after Trauma’, and ‘Fatimah/Jubilation of Flowers’, all performed by the WDR Sinfonieorchester, featuring soprano Emily Hindrichs, and conducted by Cristian Măcelaru. The booklet explains that the Annunciation Triptych ‘draws a broad line from the Greek poet Sappho to Mary, the virgin Mother of God, to Fatima, the daughter of the Prophet Muhammad, founder of Islam. The composer considers the stories of these three women as comments on ecological, spiritual and transcultural issues of our times
|
|
|
|
| | Burial Ground/ Nights of Terror - Burial Ground/ Nights of Terror ( UHD/Blu Ray) | Andrea Bianchi’s cheapo 1981 Zombie Flesheaters rip-off has no right to be called a classic. It's badly made, the acting is abysmal, and the dialogue is woeful, however, it has become one of the most beloved of all zombie movies. It’s a seriously creepy affair reminiscent of the Spanish Blind Dead movies, that utilizes a fantastic score from Berto Pisano (Death Smiled on a Murderer, Patrick Still Lives and Giallo A Venezia ) and Elsio Mancuso (Malabimba, La Collegiale, and Moglie Nuda e Siciliano) and a host of zombies that are pretty much decaying before your eyes. On top of that, it’s bonkers (in a good way), there are so many warped ideas floating around in this movie that you simply can’t ever find it dull. More on that later!.
|
|
|
|
| | NPVR - 33 34 | From beyond the grave comes the second release from NPVR, the short-lived project of Nik Void and polymathic collaborator and label founder extraordinaire, Peter Rehberg, whose untimely passing hangs over this record like a dark shroud. Comprised of five tracks, mixed and finalized by Void in Rehberg's absence, the posthumous album is a genre-hopping affair, filled with elements that would be equally at home in dark ambience, avant-garde electroacoustic composition, drone, noise, and everything in between. The frame of 33 34 is not one defined by categories, though; rather, the precision and exacting mood of this work determine its parameters and constraints.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
| | Piranha - Piranha(DVD) | The use of misleading titles is an old trick within exploitation cinema, and this early 1970s film is a prime example of this trope. The brutally munching fi...
| |
|
|
|
|
|
| | The Music of Clay Ruby & Burial H... | Over the last couple of decades Wisconsin native, Clay Ruby has been creating some of the world’s finest dark electronic music under the Burial Hex mon...
| |
|
|
|
|
|
|