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The Slow Music Movement Blog

​Reading about music is a bit like looking at pictures of food - not nearly half as much fun as getting involved, so we scribble a brief intro to hopefully whet your appetite but strongly advise you just hit play and make up your own mind.
There's a lot of music to check these days & hopefully you'll find these recommendations a handy filter.
​Trust your ears, not opinions.

31/3/2023 0 Comments

Singles round Up+A bonkers LP - march 31st, 2023

VictoRAMA - AfroRobot (Hominis Canidae)

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A slow building, cosmic jazz fusion gem by Brazil's VictoRAMA, but once that bass line fuse is lit the keys provide all the oxygen the track needs and before you know it drumstics are thrown on the flames and there's no putting  out the star reaching fusion fire in the studio. You know a tune is bad when 6 minutes flies by and you're sad when it ends.

This is currently kicking off the Slow Jazz Playlist in fine style.

Carmen jaci - Happy Child (Four Finger)

Don't judge an album by its cover unless it's the new Carmen Jaci LP which is as wild, playful, colourful, otherworldly and generally unhinged as the surreal artwork suggests. It's a safe, magical place with never a dull moment as vibrating soundwaves ping, pop, whoop, swoosh, zip and zing all over the place.
You can find her brightening up the Slow Psyche Playlist.
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Hugar - fall (Hania Rani Rework) [XXIM]

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This is a stately piece of music with Hugar's neoclassical ambient soundscapes acting as the sonic thermals that effortlessly and gracefully elevate the unhurried celestial vocals of Hania Rania through the speakers to circle seemingly forever around your listening space. Find this weightless tune in the newly minted Ambient Pop playlist.

Helioé - Grotte (Self Release)

It only seems like last week that Helioe´s debut single was gracing these pages, mainly because it was. Just as I thought things couldn't get any better he's only gone and used the stalactites/mites in Thailand's Phong Nha Cave as percussion for his light touch playing that works with rather than tramples over nature like so much human activity.
Find this sundowner in the Slow Balearic Playlist.
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Asambura-Ensemble - Winterreise interkulturell: 8. Shod Kazan - Herbst ist gekommen (decurio)

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The world's of Schubert & ancient Persian poems seem like odd bedfellows, but when tales of strangeness & loneliness intertwine with Schubert's evocations of dreams & bitter reality courtesy of the Asambura-Ensemble you end up with this emotionally raw musical metaphor for the refugee experience - an issue for our times & one that is only going to get more pressing with each passing year.
Find this heart wrenching track on the Slow World Playlist.

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31/3/2023 0 Comments

Caixa Cubo - Agôra (Jazz & Milk)

What Your Ears Say & The Cover Looks Like

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What We Say

The sounds of Brazilian jazz get some Afro-vocal assistance, revel in golden era fusion vibes and ooze deep nu-soul in this beautifully crafted LP from Sao Paulo trio Caixa Cubo, ably supported by the dependable Jazz & Milk Records. From spiritual samba to sultry late night soul & firing jazz dance, it's strictly all killer no filler.

What The Release Notes Say


Global pointing Brazilian jazz trio Caixa Cubo release their brand new album Agôra, sparkling with electric funk and Herbie-esque eclecticism. It features a myriad of guest vocalists and musicians including Brazilians Xênia França and Zé Leônidas, Jembaa Groove's Ghanaian singer Eric Owusu and South African artists Bongani Givethanks & Mpho Nkuzo.

In line with all their creations where flow and energy provide the magic, allowing what the moment provides, the album shines not only for its virtuosity but for its minimalism, the depth of space, and for the first time, the ability to figure in and outside of the jazz fold, as the trio decided, for the first time, to bring in singers and add a new aesthetic to their sound.

“Agôra is a wake-up call to reality, a reminder that the infinite possibilities of technological progress should not disconnect us from the earth, from eye-to-eye relationships, and from moments lived in person” the band are keen to point out. “And that we must not be consumed by greed, for all we truly possess.... is the NOW.”

CREDITS
An album conceived, composed and recorded by Caixa Cubo in in November 2021 at Jazz & Milk studios in Cologne, Germany.

Recorded, mixed and mastered by Chris 'Dusty‘ Doepke
Artwork by Tim Schmitt

FOR MORE KILLER JAZZ FUSIONS CHECK THE INDEPENDENT ARTISTS & NEW SOUNDS IN THE SLOW JAZZ PLAYLIST

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30/3/2023 0 Comments

Virke - II (Flora & Fauna)

What Your ears Say & The Cover Looks Like


What We Say

Virke are back in the town with the aptly titled II, the follow up to their 80's inspired Hovsjö 80 for Flora & Fauna. Once again there is a wistful edge to the vintage drum machine powered downtempo sounds, as if they're still hankering for the carefree days of yore, as various instruments intertwine with the unhurried electronica giving you plenty of time to wallow in thoughts of endless summer holidays, first kisses & debt free days.

What The Release Notes Say

Virke are a trio consisting of Billie Lindahl, Rickard Jäverling and Henrik von Euler. The second album II is based around the same minimal concept of the first album Hovsjö 80 but with greater variety in sounds and visions.

The album was recorded in Herräng and Årsta with the fundamentals being Billie and Rickard on baritone guitars and Henrik on drum machine, Mellotrone and accordion.

Apart from the group the album also features guest appearances by Andreas Tilliander on Raagini Digital Electronic Tanpura & Taal Tarang Digital Power and Martin Sörbom on percussion.


If you want more downtempo sounds with a somewhat warmer vibe then hit play on the Slow Balearic Playlist sometime

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28/3/2023 0 Comments

New Singles from Independent Artists - March 29th, 2023

Ian Hawgood - Low Light Tokyo (Self Release)

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Ian Hawgood keeps his head down in the studio rather than flaunting his talents on social media, but through his productions and Home normal label he's cemented himself as one of the most important figures in 21st century ambient music. Well he's just snuck some new Bandcamp recordings out so you can find out why. He's also a regular in the Slow Ambient Playlist.

Inbal Dushy - mdtn.codex (Naive Records)

There aren't many 12 minutes long tracks that seems like they finish too quickly but this new immersive electronic epic from Inbal Dushy slowly invites you into its painstaking sound design, ambient sensibility & pleasing machine noises like a warm duvet in winter & before you know it reality was a distant memory & you're comfortingly cocooned in its warm folds. Find him currently in the Slowtronic Playlist.
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Hugh Klein - Lead The Way (Lekker Collective)

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New Zealand, a bit like Scotland, really punches above its weight musically for such a small population; with an especial fondness for giving an antipodean twist to 20th century black music. So light a candle, pour your partner a glass of something nice & get cosy with the deep, low slung,  late night lovers soul of Hugh Klein. You can also find him making the first move in the Slow Soul Playlist.

Arswain - Bust (Self Release)

Although a self styled conceptual electronic composer the new track from Arswain is actually a fine slice of microdosed, alt-pop. There's an unassuming catchiness to the vocal & groove, which float over the impressively ambient electronic & warm low end frequencies before creeping up on you like a playful friend & making you thankful for the invention of the repeat button. Find him hanging out in the Slow Pop Playlist.
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27/3/2023 0 Comments

YoshimiOizumikiYoshiduO - To The Forest To Live A Truer Life (Thrill Jockey)

What Your Ears Say & The Cover Looks LIke


What We Say

Improvised musical magic realism from YoshimiO & IzumikiYoshi on Thrill Jockey. Deep in peaceful & blissful Mahoroba, YoshimiO used the piano & her voice to express unfiltered thoughts, feelings & reactions to immediate surroundings. These were then processed by IzumikiYoshi & remixed with the original sounds to blur the boundaries between improvised, intentional, past, present, future & put some cracks in reality tunnel walls. It's ride gets wilder as it goes & should give your Monday a suitably surreal kick up its depressing arse.

What The Release Notes Say

Inspired by how she feels at the moment, what direction she’s facing, the people she’s surrounded by, and the energy of the location, YoshimiO uses the piano and her voice to create sound. IzumikiYoshi uses a microphone to pick up the raw sounds created by YoshimiO and feeds it through his modular synthesizer, where the sounds undergo spectral processing and modulation. These electronic tones are combined and mixed again with YoshimiO’s live sounds in a spontaneous manner, to output the sounds that were only in their imagination. That is how the music of YoshimiOizumikiYoshiduO is created.

The duo’s debut album To The Forest To Live A Truer Life combines the thrill and precision of masterful improvised music practitioners unearthing new sonic possibilities. YoshimiO’s kinetic energy saturates the album’s every pore. For the first time using the piano as her primary instrument in addition to her singular voice, YoshimiO’s every move is bent, stretched, and mutated by IzumikiYoshi’s modular synthesizer into cascades of brightly colored waves and dotted constellations of sound. A balance of YoshimiO’s raw live improvisations and IzumikiYoshi’s correlated processed sounds give the pieces a sense of grounding and weightlessness in tandem. Stark piano figures that recall bluesy phrasings or classical progressions warp into beams of fizzling synthesizer. YoshimO’s voice undulates and echoes in wild tendrils. Rather than taming YoshimiO’s spirited performances, IzumikiYoshi adorns every unique flutter with complementary otherworldly textures. Recorded primarily in a cafe nestled in a forest in Japan, To The Forest To Live A Truer Life is a celebration of pure potential, of music born of the moment expanding in every direction.

CREDITS
piano&voice / YoshimiO
modular synthesizer / izumikiYoshi

recorded by izumikiYoshimiO in the forest of maho-roba on Oct. 2020 and vocals fo #5 track recorded by KABAMIX @LMD on Mar. 2021

mixed and mastered by IZUMI KIYOSHI on Aug. 2021
words by YoshimiO

photo of poster by HOMMA TAKASHI
art work by OOIDO SYOUJOU, izumikiYoshimiO
designed by IZUMI KIYOSHI
translated by HASHIM KOTARO BHAROOCHA

THANXTO
Futagawa Junko,
Izumi Jun

For more familiar improvised sounds let the sounds of the Slow Jazz Playlist reverberate around your space.

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26/3/2023 0 Comments

Richard Norris - Deep Listening 2019-2022 (Group Mind)

What Your Ears Say & The Cover Looks Like


What We Say

Richard Norris has been around the world of music since the days of rave, flitting from genre to genre as he sees fit. Recent times have seen a deep immersion into the world of ambient music, with regular 20 minute long transmissions designed for deep listening, pagan revivalism & general wellbeing. If you haven't been paying attention then take a dive into the this tasting menu compilation of his journey so far - it's the perfect Sunday soundtrack.

What The Release Notes Say

Deep Listening 2019 - 2022 is a compilation of tracks from Richard Norris' recent deep listening, ambient and electronic work for the Group Mind and Inner Mind labels. The twenty tracks have been re-edited, mastered and compiled into a handy primer that is released digitally and on a single CD and double vinyl album.

CREDITS
Written and Produced by Richard Norris, 2019 - 2022.
Published by Mute Song.
Art by Marc Fox @theurbanefox
Design by Lyndon Pike.
Released by Group Mind.

If you need an extended Sunday sound bath then take a soak in the Slow Ambient Playlist:

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25/3/2023 0 Comments

Genevieve Lacey - Breathing Space (Australian Broadcasing Corporation)

What Your Ears Say & The Cover Looks Like

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What We Say

This new sound installation launching next week in Ngunnawal, Ngunawal and Ngambri Country to soundtrack the "Garden" of Australian Dreams at the National Museum of Australia is a gem. Orchestrated by Genevieve Lacey,  it combines the words of Alexis Wright - the garden's inspiration, with environmental, fauna rich field recordings & often evocative compositions to otherworldly effect, & will be much needed organic support in the rather brutalistic toy box "garden".

What The Release Notes Say

In 2020, the National Museum of Australia commissioned musician and composer Genevieve Lacey to create new ways for audiences to engage with its iconic Garden of Australian Dreams (GoAD).

The result is Breathing Space – a rewilding in sound. This permanent sound installation is a groundbreaking way to make the GoAD more welcoming to visitors, enabling them to create their own real and imagined connections to place. Breathing Space animates the site with sound, making it enticing and alive; a place to explore, discover, play, rest and reflect.
As they move within the GoAD, visitors will hear familiar and unfamiliar sounds: choruses of frogs and cicadas, the flutter of strings, percussive creaks and rattles, subterranean rumbles from the deep oceans, human voices whispering, speaking, and singing, and beautiful instrumental phrases, layered and abstracted into patterns.

The sound garden is inspired by texts by Alexis Wright – activist, author, documentary maker and member of the Waanyi Nation from the highlands of the southern Gulf of Carpentaria. Her words are heard, whispered, and spoken by a chorus of voices of women and gender nonconforming people aged 6 - 87, and are interwoven with choral song, environmental field recordings, percussive accompaniments, and composed music. With speakers discreetly distributed throughout the garden, the entire space quietly resonates and beckons visitors, emanating life. It draws visitors into a reverie of place, and a meditation on their own relationship to land and listening, and celebrates fragile ecologies – of species, language, Country, culture.

Genevieve worked with over 60 people to bring her vision to life. Musical collaborators include Lou Bennett (Yorta Yorta Dja Dja Wurrung; voice), Consort of Melbourne (dir. Steve Hodgson, choir), Vahideh Eisaei (qanun), Simon Martyn-Ellis (theorbo, baroque guitar), Linda Kent (pipe organ), Sunny Kim (voice), Marshall McGuire (harp), Phil Slater (trumpet), Speak Percussion (dir. Eugene Ughetti), Amadou Suso (kora), Erkki Veltheim (violin and viola), Mindy Meng Wang (guzheng).
Creative team consisted of: Genevieve Lacey (composer & creator), Alexis Wright (writer), Ruth Little (associate artist), Jim Atkins (sound design), Martel Ollerenshaw – Arts & Parts (executive producer), Linda Kent (visual artist), Paul Lim – Additive (technical production manager), Ashley Simonetto (branding and graphic design), Jared Yapp (audio research), Katherine Tonkin (spoken voice consultant), Jess Zhang (cultural consultant) and Tom McKeand (audio system programmer).

Breathing Space in the Garden of Australian Dreams, National Museum of Australia, Canberra / Ngunnawal, Ngunawal and Ngambri Country – opens to the public on 31 March 2023.


You can find one of the tracks sounding quite at home in the Slow World Playlist:

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24/3/2023 0 Comments

Singles Round Up - March 24th, 2023

Nikki Oniyome - Understimated [Ambient Rmx] (Metronomicon)

Loving this remix of Nikki Oniyome. The original track dropped 4 years ago with the vocal dropped over a simple old school hip hop beat but this remix has taken the affecting vocal to a next level, cosmic ambient dimension and deserves your love.
It looks like I launched the Ambient Pop Playlist jus in time.
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Scrimshire & Nat Birchall - Unforgotten, Unforgiven (Albert's Favourites)

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A poignant slice of spiritual jazz from Scrimshire & Birchall - a couple of my favourite UK jazzers. Shocked, as most right thinking people are, by the UK's increasingly inhumane immigration policy this is a moving tribute to all the people escaping horrors & hardship by attempting hazardous boat crossings to greener pastures. If that wasn't enough the artwork depicts two people laden boats - one still upright & the other capsized. Let that sink in for a moment.
You can currently find this track in the Slow Jazz Playlist.

Helioé - Aube (Self Release)

If this fauna field recording filled new age ambient tune from Helioé is anything to go by then Tasmania is a place of unspoilt wonder. Thankfully his keyboard duet with the natural world  treads suitably lightly, as what is more wonderful than nature? Excitingly he also drops his debut LP next month.
Until then find him in the New Age of New Age playlist.
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Night Gestalt - False Azure (Bigo & Twigetti)

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Living in southern Europe I take the abundant light for granted, even on grey Spring days like today. In Sweden there is no such complacency as highlighted by Night Gestalt's new single & forthcoming LP which started life in the Spring & musically tracks the lengthening of the days until the summer solstice. He even relented on his no more piano LP vow, albeit by bastardising the sounds to barely recognisable shadows, & reassembling them to lilting, hypnotic effect.
Head to the Slow Neoclassical list for this & much more.

ceratone - Ultraviolet (Self Release)

Nothing sonically new to report here, but that's just fine as CERATONE wraps his cosmic electronica and perfectly affected vocal snippets around some perfectly programmed, percussion-lite glitchy broken beats to imbue you with yogic flying ability; much to the amazement I'm guessing of the other people in the supermarket.
Find him currently lighting up the Slowtronic Playlist
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23/3/2023 0 Comments

The Slow Music Movement Radio Show #75

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Fragile ambient beauty, inventive electronica, good old psychedelic folk, electroacoustic delights, dream pop & deep soul; all from lesser known independent artists. The new radio show for the excellent Music for Dreams station is here.

Hiroshi Ebina - Breath (Mystery Circles)
Cisser Mæhl - Klaverstemmeren (Sonic Pieces)
Ben McElroy & A Spot On The Hill - Journal in the Drawer (The Slow Music Movement)
Buck Curran - Winter Solstice 2 (for Steffen) [Obsolete]
Matt Rösner - Pulled Back Together (Room 40)
1k Flowers - Shield Siren (Unguarded)
Sluice - Fourth of July (Ruination)
Old Earth Nostalgia Cult - Field Study (Self Release)
Jim Nopédie - winter sun through train window (Infloresce)
Glinca - Contemplation n.1 (Shimmering Moods)
Genevieve Lacey - All Time Is Intertwined (Australian Broadcasting Corporatin)
Daniel Rotem - Wave Nature (Colorfield)
Pieta Brown, JT Bates - In This World (Righteous Babe)
Payfone & Kid Nereida - I Feel You (Leng)

Don't forget our Spotify playlists if you need a fix in between shows. They're also available on Youtube, Soundcloud, Deezer & Apple Music - search and you will find.
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22/3/2023 0 Comments

Twoosty Mayonez - Carmin (U Know Me Records)

What Your Ears Say & The Cover Looks Like

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What We Say

Fresh, cosmic, jazz not jazz vibes from Poland's wonderfully named Twoosty Mayonez via U Know Me. After crashing their spaceship into a field of magic mushrooms & releasing clouds of psilocybin into the atmosphere - affecting 70% of the native extraterrestrials, they then embark on a wild sci-fi soundtrack indebted, psychedelic jazz fusion ride as they surf the waves of altered consciousness trying to get their ship repaired & make it home for dinner. Thanks to Twisted Soul for the tip.

What The Release Notes Say

Things don't always go your way, especially when your plans involve space travel. In the case of Captain Harrison Focus's expedition, it started innocently, but no one was prepared for an emergency landing on the mysterious planet Carmin. Only then did the real fight for survival begin. This record tells the story of a dangerous expedition into space that began on February 6, 2023.

Twoosty Mayonez consists of Bartosz Wolert (drums) and Dominik Kaniewski (bass guitar and synthesizers). "Carmin" is their debut album, which is released primarily on vinyl by U Know Me Records.

Twoosty Mayonez is something your grandfather would listen to with your younger sister.
Non-standard-jazz approach combined with the search for strange sounds, resulted in the concept album "Carmin" created by Bartosz Wolert (drums), and Dominik Kaniewski (bass guitar).
The trio closes with the 80GN4 robot, which was programmed to play a synthesizer part.

-------------------------

Nie zawsze wszystko idzie po Twojej myśli, szczególnie gdy plany dotyczą podróży kosmicznej. W przypadku wyprawy kapitana Harrisona Focusa zaczęło się niewinnie, ale na awaryjne lądowanie na tajemniczej planecie Carmin nikt nie był przygotowany. Dopiero tam zaczęła się prawdziwa walka o przetrwanie. Ta płyta opowiada historię pewnej niebezpiecznej wyprawy w kosmos, która rozpoczęła się 6. lutego 2023 roku.

Twoosty Mayonez tworzą Bartosz Wolert (perkusja) i Dominik Kaniewski (gitara basowa i syntezatory). „Carmin” to ich debiutancki album, który ukazuje się przede wszystkim na płycie winylowej sumptem U Know Me Records.

Płyta wydana jest w dwóch wersjach (z klasycznym czarnym winylem lub w wersji limitowanej z kolorowym winylem niespodzianką, gdzie każda płyta jest inna). Cała oprawa graficzna to dzieło Kacpra Pieńka, który do każdego z utworów namalował dedykowany obraz, ich reprodukcje znaleźć można w dołączonym do każdej z płyt booklecie. Miks przygotował Maciej "Envee" Goliński, a mastering to dzieło Michała "Eproma" Baja.


CREDITS
Graphic design: Kacper Pieniek
Mix: Eprom
Master: Envee

For more forward looking jazz fusion from independent artists take a dive in the Slow Jazz basement playlist

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