A sweet, charming & pleasantly chilled start to the week from Melbourne's Jim Nopédie via Infloresce. Here he artfully combines soft edged, misty eyed, vintage computer game sounds with a pre-glyphosate pastoral vibe that transports you back to a more innocent time when bills were for birds, your tea magically appeared on the dining table & pollinators still buzzed around the countryside.

Upon finishing his new mini-album Keep It Rolling, Jim Nopédie was interviewed by longtime friend and collaborator Margot Morales.

???

MM: What’s your favourite thing in your house?

JN: Besides my little music room, probably the shelf where I currently have a CD and cassette deck, box of Sina Ginger Candy, talking Billy Bass fish, and the golf ball I got when I bought the last Mario Golf game.

MM: What led you create to this album and how did you arrive at the need to "Keep It Rolling"?

JN: Keep It Rolling is a sort of mantra for a nicer, gentler version of life. I think everything’s been really heavy for a lot of people lately—even my last album was really solemn and dark. So I thought the most challenging thing I could do this time was to make a record about smallness and lightness and momentum.

???

This is just an excerpt—the full interview transcript can be found in the included liner notes.

Keep It Rolling!
-Jim NopédieAll music by James Gales
Artwork by Lolita Chiong

CREDITS
Liner notes interview by Margot Morales
Album mastered by aivi & surasshu

Special thanks: Dom, Geordie, Melbourne Electronic Sound Studio, everyone at Infloresce, Mum & Dad


✨?✨
Produced by
Infloresce Records
infloresce.com

If his gentle ambient ways can be a judge of such things, Hiroshi Ebina sounds like a man at peace. With his new LP for Mystery Circles he slowly sips his half full glass & patiently, with soft, reassuring sounds & succinct, measured tones ushers you away from the news headlines & towards life's simple joys; lifting you through the grey clouds to see the blue sky & sunshine the other side.

Hiroshi Ebina’s new album is a follow up to the previously released 'It Just Is', and is focused on finding the silver lining in life’s challenging situations. With a minimal approach using acoustic and electric instruments, the album evolves from simple collections of notes into quiet yet complex forms of music. It’s a gentle reminder that nothing unreal can harm us, whether it’s about past events or predictions for the future. All difficulties come with a seed of happiness, and the darkest time is always followed by the dawn. Hiroshi Ebina dedicates this album to his partner Miki, who gave him tremendous support when he was going through some difficulties in his own life.

CREDITS
Music by Hiroshi Ebina
Mastered by Joseph Branciforte

MC067
mysterycircles.com

Somewhere at the intersection of misreading the scales whilst microdosing, vaporwave, sun warped jazz cassettes, cosmic ambient, Sci-Fi B-movie soundtracks, lo-fi easy listening & New Age wellness videos from the early 70s you'll find the new Lionmilk transmission for Leaving Records. Don't be scared of the haze, come on in - it's a safe space.

Lionmilk, the primary solo project of Los Angeles musician/composer/producer, Moki Kawaguchi, for some time now, operates in an explicitly therapeutic mode. 2021’s I Hope You Are Well was originally self-released during the onset of the pandemic as a limited run of home-dubbed cassettes, which Kawaguchi hand-delivered to loved ones’ mailboxes in a sort of guerrilla care campaign—a modest attempt to mitigate the sudden, profound alienation that prevailed during those early lockdown months. When Lionmilk and Leaving Records later collaborated on an official release for I Hope You Are Well, this once humble project’s impact grew exponentially, with countless fans (old and new alike) granted access to the warmth and beauty of Lionmilk’s inner circle. Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222, out March 17, 2023 on Leaving, presents the listener with yet another opportunity for deep cosmic healing.

When discussing Lionmilk, Kawaguchi regularly foregrounds the absolute necessity of music-making as a form of self-care. First and foremost, he produces sounds and songs that provide him with some modicum of solace — “music to feel less whack to.” One gets the sense that he’d be doing exactly what he’s doing (exactly the way he’s doing it) even if he was the last man on earth. But he isn’t. And, in fact, one of Lionmilk’s primary concerns—evident across track titles, as well as the sung and spoken words that dot his releases—is community, or more specifically, what it means to exist and act in his community. Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222 ventures deeper into the paradoxes explored to great effect on I Hope You Are Well. How might we transmit our solitudes via music and to what extent? What does a shared solitude sound and feel like? And, in the context of this transaction, what novel relationships arise between the recording artist and the listener?

The record begins with a radio transmission from the depths of Lionmilk’s celestial innerspace— “Hello. Is anybody out there? This is Lionmilk speaking, and you are tuned into the Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222. Standby. We are commencing broadcast” — a retro sci-fi movie motif that recurs throughout Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222’s 26 tracks. But space travel here functions more-so as a metaphor for deep soul work, for journeying inward, through the vast unknowns of one’s own consciousness. What follows is an intimate, diaristic song suite, grounded in the struggle to keep our hearts alive and open amidst an onslaught of daily indignities.

Tracks like “daily i dream,” “lover’s theme,” and “hopeful i can change,” function as brief, instrumental meditations on those moments when hope suddenly, inexplicably eclipses despair. The soulful standout “treat yourself like a friend” contains perhaps the lyrical apotheosis of Lionmilk’s current iteration: “...I get up / to pee and drink water / treating myself a little bit softer / you do your best / today will be better / I’ll do my best / I’ll do my best / I promise.”

Composed of loops, sketches, improvizations, and voice memos recorded directly to a single cassette tape, Intergalactic Warp Terminal 222 flutters, warbles, and lilts along seamlessly — an hour-long, lo-fi and jazzy paean to compassion, while clearly indebted to the ambient idiom, nevertheless constitutes some of the most politically engaged and energizing music yet from Lionmilk.

CREDITS
Recorded, produced, and mixed by Lionmilk
Additional mixing on track 17 & 19 by Swarvy
Mastered by Daddy Kev
Portrait Photo by Sabrina Mansury Sharifi
Art by Lionmilk
Bio by Emmett Shoemaker

With the West seemingly locked in a dance music pastiche death spiral any meaningful rave innovation in the last 15 years has come from Africa and the Lisbon diaspora. So if you haven't taken a ride on the deep bouncing percussive Amapiano basslines yet then the new DJ Black Low LP on Awesome Tapes From Africa will get you up to speed & introduce you to some of the freshest new vocal stylings since grime ripped up the urban poetry rule book.

There’s more than a hint of ambition on the double LP sophomore effort from Sam Austin Rabede, the producer known as DJ Black Low. Pretoria, South Africa-born and based, the young man makes amapiano with new ways of expressing this local-turned-global style of dance music.
In DJ Black Low’s musical imagination, the songs manage to smoothly vacillate between dreamy and firmly-grounded. Adorned with vocalists across most of the twelve tracks, there’s a new dimension to Black Low’s now-signature approach to abstract, angular deconstruction of the rhythmic developments in his songs.

The album references influences and ambitions in its song titles and lyrics while the music itself is anthemic in its sonic and structural aspirations. On many of the songs a slow-burning tension transforms into something unexpected until you’re somewhere else as the track concludes. There is an emotional and compositional maturity that builds on his earlier work. Vocals and lyrics are in focus. Production collaborators among Black Low’s Gauteng Province circle add to the constantly churning array of ideas that populate this consistently surprising release. Despite being a relative newcomer, DJ Black Low is onto something here.

CREDITS
All songs composed and recorded in Pretoria, South Africa in 2021 by 
Sam Austin Radebe (except where otherwise noted).

Mastering by Jessica Thompson.

I'm going to back to my roots for today's tip, so say hello to Goldings, Rastegar & Rounds the funkiest trio that Daptone never signed, as they manage to put their own jazz juiced, soul soaked twist on those classic 20th grooves, ranging from sunny West coast smoothies, steamy organ menage a trois', reggae riddims & cinematic exotica for Ropeadope.

The Great Pandemic of 2020 will be remembered for any number of tragic occurrences; Millions of dead, hospitals overwhelmed to their limits, a catalyst for the already toxic polarization along political lines, the delightful discovery of online grocery shopping. For musicians, the real tragedy was that Covid-19 essentially restricted their ability to congregate in the same room for the express purpose of musical expression—in other words, their primary reason for living. “When things shut down in March of 2020 I remember feeling like life as I knew it was over–not to be too hyperbolic,” remembered bassist Kaveh Rastegar. “Lots of questions and uncertainty came in. Before, I never questioned why things mattered or didn’t, and I also took so much for granted in my musical life...opportunities to play, record and tour. The venues and studios to get together and record or perform in...they were all closed,” he remembered. One of those lost playing opportunities for Rastegar was with keyboardist Larry Goldings, who, just before the pandemic, had reached out to him to make some music together. They had gotten to record and perform together with singer Colin Hay (Men at Work), and, in Goldings’ words, “soon discovered that his musicianship extended throughout many genres and skills, including songwriting, production, and a gift for putting interesting people together.” Goldings hired Rastegar to play bass for a movie he scored (“Dealin’ With Idiots,” a 2013 comedy directed by and starring comedian Jeff Garlin), and they have since collaborated on many projects. “I’ve always loved Larry’s playing. He has played with everyone, and he is everyone’s favorite musician to work with,” said Rastegar. “He can play anything and has such a love and appetite for so much different music. As many people know,” he added, “he’s also a gifted comic who is so much fun to be around.”

Abe Rounds was Goldings’ choice to be the third of this new trio. Rastegar first met Rounds through Meshell Ndegeocello, whom she had flown in from Boston to record drums on her album “Comet Come to Me” (Naïve 2014), and on which Rastegar had written a song, “Conviction.” Goldings came to know Rounds more recently, noting he seemed to be “showing up everywhere” in all walks of musical life. “One of Abe’s rare gifts is simply feel,” explained Goldings. “By bringing Abe into a session playing a tambourine, or some other single percussion instrument, any band seems to be lifted up and made more funky, more in the pocket, more joyous.” Goldings hired Rounds for the soundtrack to the 2019 Netflix limited series, “Self Made: Inspired by the Life of Madam C.J. Walker.” Of Rounds’ work on that project, Goldings could not be more complimentary. “Abe’s contributions became crucial to the musical fabric of the series and made me fully aware of his production talents and overall musicianship,” he said, adding, “Abe is a quiet, and humble person who’s many rare gifts seem to keep unfolding in front of you.” Rounds had been a fan of Goldings long before they met, having listened to him on records with a variety of musicians: James Taylor, Bill Stewart, John Scofield to name a few. “I admire Larry’s ability to mix with the highest echelon of jazz musicians without sacrificing his ability to be a supportive sideman,” said Rounds. “His wealth of experience and musicianship is contagious and creates a musical elevator to lift me and others to their highest artistic selves.” Rastegar is similarly fond of Rounds for those things, saying “Abe is so well rounded and fully formed as a musician–He has such a maturity to his playing and such a sense of who he is and what is right for whatever situation he’s playing in.” The three of them had begun to trade text messages about getting together to play, with no agenda beyond trying to make some music together, when their plans, like so many other, were undone by Covid-19. It would be a full year before Goldings, making the assessment that it was possible to meet and play safely, reached out again to Rastegar and Rounds to follow through on their intentions. “Perhaps without realizing it,” mused Goldings, “I craved to be around some highly creative, positive people to offset the darkness that of the pandemic.” They booked a good number of days in a studio in the Northeast L.A. neighborhood of Eagle Rock, owned by engineer Pete Min. “Pete Min was such a huge part of this project. His studio is the perfect lab for a project like this,” said Rastegar, calling the gifted musician and engineer the “4th member of this band.” Goldings and Rounds concurred, with Goldings adding, “Pete’s studio is like a candy shop for me, with pristine analog gear everywhere, and I loved the thought of being in that environment with these great people.” It is not out of bounds to confuse the words “musician” and “magician,” for master musicians can indeed conjure something substantial out of thin air. For these three, many of the songs they created started from simply jamming together, falling into a chord progression that would become the bedrock for the many layers of sound all three players would add in ensuing overdubs. And this is where these pieces reveal their true brilliance, as super-funky vehicles for incredibly well-crafted organizations of sonic delight, a delicious display of infinite timbres and textures. Rastegar is teaching a clinic on how to play bass lines in every conceivable popular music style, from soul to funk to reggae to 60’s jazz-pop, drawing on the wealth of experience he has amassed playing with artists ranging from the progressive jazz group Kneebody and rock-immortal Ringo Starr to pop-icons John Legend and Sia. Rounds goes above and beyond basic beat-making to establish endless variations of groove, blending acoustic and electronic sounds in a meticulous gumbo of rhythmic texture, in addition to playing synths and guitar on a few tracks. But it is Goldings himself who puts forth a gushing geyser-fount of ideas in every possible way, from the references to what must be the entire world history of chordal harmony, to the multitude of distinct sounds he is able to coax out of the Hammond B-3, to the impressive (and somewhat surprising) array of electro-mechanical and analog synthesizer elements woven into the sonic fabric. Goldings utilized the many instruments in Min’s studio to the utmost. “The opportunity to really explore within the environment of analog keyboards is rare for me, especially in the context of a band,” he explained. “Playing synths and Rhodes, etc. were a big part of my childhood musical explorations and this opportunity brought me back to a very special place in my heart.” A special place that is now fully revealed for all to experience and benefit from. Larry Goldings in singular form is often more than enough, but to hear multiple versions of him simultaneously on every track here is a reward so lavish none on earth deserve, yet we greedily accept and devour.

The songs themselves are also an object lesson in variety and diversity. “Better,” the title track, is a funky, feel-good proclamation of what these gentlemen experienced as they played again for the first time. “Yeah Yeah Yeah” is a reggae-type vamp named after an utterance by composer Abe Rounds, which found its way into the arrangement. “Stockwell” is a kind of western tango, something that made Rastegar think of Dean Stockwell’s character in the David Lynch film “Blue Velvet.” 84 beats per minute is the tempo and the original working title for “Mary Lou,” an homage to the gymnast who won the gold medal in 1984. It’s a soul-inspired throwback that features some outstanding synth work by Goldings. “But Wait, There’s Les” is a funky boogaloo that reminded Rastegar of a Les McCann song. “Bob James” is a mellow soft-rock tribute to the legendary fusion keyboardist, but Goldings’ piano work on the track could have just as easily been dedicated to his one-time mentor, Keith Jarrett. “Temple Bar” features a couple of bassline grooves that originated from Rastegar’s early days in Los Angeles, when he said he played at that erstwhile club “at least four nights out of the week for at least four years.” “Reprise,” a reprise of the first track, “Better,” was ironically the Very first thing the trio did when they first got together to play, setting the tone for the entire session. The final track, “I Want to be Happy,” is the only non-original tune, the standard given a tongue-in-cheek 60s-era treatment, as if performed on an old consumer-model Lowery Organ, complete with auto-drums (but that’s certainly no amateur musician on the piano!).

The experience of making this music carries quite a bit of meaning for these three musicians. “We quickly realized how much BETTER this experience made us all feel, amidst the uncertainty and darkness of Covid,” said Goldings, “and Abe, Kaveh and Pete were my musical, creative and psychological salvation during the early days. I’m really indebted to them.” “This record was special,” said Rounds, “because it was my first in-person human musical interaction for at least a year.” Rastegar added, “Again, not to be too dramatic, but getting together with Larry and Abe and playing music reminded me that I could still play the bass–music was still a thing I could do.” These sentiments mirrored those that were near-universal among all musicians, many of whom have professed to feeling profound relief and joy at the resumption of a social artistic life.

What we all realized was getting together to make music made us feel...well, better.

-Gary Fukushima

CREDITS
Recorded July and September of 2020 at Lucy’s Meat Market, Eagle Rock, CA
Recorded, Mixed, Mastered and closely collaborated with by Pete Min
Produced by Larry Goldings, Kaveh Rastegar, Abe Rounds and Pete Min

Larry Goldings: Piano, Organ, Clavinet, Arp 2600, Arp String Ensemble, Prophet, Pocket Piano

Kaveh Rastegar: Fender Precision Bass, Fender Musicmaster Bass, Guitar on “Temple Bar”

Abe Rounds: Drums, Percussion, Oberheim RD-8 and Vermona DM-1 Drum Machines, Guitar on “Yeah Yeah Yeah” and “Les”, Arp 2600 on “Mary Lou”

Additional Musician:
Bob Magnuson: Woodwinds on “Reprise” with parts arranged by John Sneider

Special thanks to Pete Min, John Sneider, Christine Kim, Sara Shirazi and Kirra Bennett

“I want to be happy, but I won’t be happy till I make you happy too”

WAAN are a Dutch keys & sax duo with more chemistry than Breakin' Bad, exploring all sorts of tempo fluctuating, stylistic avenues in the way only restless minded, top drawer, improvisatory kinds can. From hip hop & Afrofuturism, psychedelic cinematic to cosmic ballads strap in for some of 2023s freshest so far, via Sonar Kollektiv.

WAAN represents the musical marriage of seasoned saxophonist Bart Wirtz and keyboard wiz Emiel van Rijthoven. As a pair of self-confessed tech nerds hailing from The Netherlands, their bromance was a slow burning one, but nevertheless their eventual collaboration fulfilled a dream that they’d both held close since first working together back in 2010.
The symphonic soul mates formed WAAN - a Dutch word literally meaning “delusion” but in the more positive sense of “living in the moment” - originally as a collaborative live band but eventually came to the conclusion that the creative process was best kept between the two of them. Any other instrumentalists were used as guest session musicians and the pair found themselves running the project in a way more akin to dance music producers. This of course had an influence on the music itself, which the duo wanted to be more crossover and have a more experimental edge to its sound.

By 2018 much of the album you hear today had been recorded, with many tracks being born out of the freestyle jams that Bart and Emiel had engaged in. One great example of that is Chivat, originally recorded as a jam with Bart leading the way on the saxophone and Emiel adding edgy keys with arpeggiators on top. Once the basic sketch of the song had been worked out, the band recorded the final version, as well as a more mellow alternative take that also appears on the album. Singles Omi and KinK sprang to life in a similar way, with the former emerging from a sombre Ethiopique bass & drum groove and the latter out of a Dr. John style voodoo beat conjured up during one of the final recording sessions the band made.

Elsewhere, certain tracks had more complicated and convoluted journeys. Lost was born out of Emiel’s confusion about what WAAN’s identity actually was, and it wasn’t until the addition of Bart’s Harmoniser saxophone, and several versions down the line, that it became the track you hear today; Frequence started as an irregular drum and bass pattern, still in time, but randomly played, and was eventually brought to life with detuned Gamelan drums, harmonised clarinet and saxophone plus a heavy synth solo that takes it from daunting and earthy to ethereal and heavenly; elsewhere 1974 is named after its musical structure, and grew from Emiel’s minimal piano, with something of a Philip Glass feel, to something way more epic and orchestral thanks to Bart’s layers of counter-rhythmic sax, flugelhorn, French horn, trumpet and a colossal wall of synths that give it an immense, symphonious finale; Hard Cane Bone started with a bass line and an unusual melody that doesn’t really fit the key, giving it a more sinister Dirty Harry type of soundtrack feel; and The Cricketer (a track named after the duo’s favourite pub in Manchester, England) only found its feet when a guiro - a Mexican percussive instrument made from an animal’s jaw - was added to give it a more foot friendly feel; and finally in contrast, Open, the last piece of music to be recorded on the album, was written in one session and was more of a collaboration between Bart and Oscar de Jong (Kraak & Smaak) with Emiel adding synths and new session players in the shape of drummer Mark Schilders and Rik Kraak providing bass and “noise” - perhaps the shape of things to come?

The album’s title reflects the relationship between WAAN’s two members. They are the echo of each other’s echo - a symbiotic and never ending musical relationship. The appellation also suggests that you’ll definitely need to listen to this collection of songs at least twice to discover the myriad of subtle details and influences that are on show. Influences as disparate as Floating Points, Belgian band Stuff, BadBadNotGood and Eddie Harris. Echo Echo is far more complex than just being a dance music influenced jazz record. Co-producer Oscar de Jong encouraged the pair to play freely as part of a jazz group and then add the electronic elements. As a result the album owes as much to Duke Ellington and Lalo Schiffrin as it does NERD and The Eurythmics! We hope you return to it again and again.

CREDITS
Bart Wirtz plays D’Addario reeds

Produced by Oscar de Jong & WAAN

Recorded by Lucas Meijers at The Eminent Studios, Leiden

Additional recordings at Longtrack Studio, Utrecht, The Eminent Studios and Kraak & Smaak Studios, Leiden

Mixed by Oscar de Jong at Kraak & Smaak Studios, Leiden Mastered by Darius van Helfteren at Amsterdam Mastering

Artwork by Bráulio Amado

Product management by Oliver Glage

Management and Bookings:
Adore Management info@adoremanagement.com
www.instagram.com/waan_music

Unfathomably this rhythmic, time transcending, free spirited New Age ambient eulogy from Joe Westerlund via Psychic Hotline is not for one, but three friends and mentors who passed in a short space of time. I'm sure words were also said and written, but this remembrance, utilizing music's unique ability to communicate emotion, from a skilled musician dispenses with the platitudes and captures an essence that words could never convey.

Joe Westerlund was reluctant to record, shy about what he might just play. It was February 2022, and Westerlund—the lauded composer, improviser, bandleader, and session drummer for the likes of Califone, Watchhouse, and Bon Iver—had booked three days at Betty’s, the wooded studio haven of his occasional bandmates in Sylvan Esso. He had worked for a year on Elegies for the Drift, his second solo percussion album and a set of poignant pieces about a triumvirate of mentors who had recently died or were dying.

But he had one last idea, one more remembrance for his confidant and collaborator, Akron/Family’s Miles Cooper Seaton, who had passed in a car crash exactly a year earlier. Westerlund queued up samples of Seaton speaking during a local performance, plus the sound of a hailstorm he’d recorded 15 minutes after receiving that awful news. Sitting there alone in the studio, save for audio engineer Alli Rogers, he wondered exactly what he was doing, or if he could be so vulnerable around a near-stranger he’d hired for help. Finally, he closed his eyes, thought about what Seaton would do in such a situation, and played his feelings. The result— “The Circle,” seven minutes of wobbly bells and warped voices, coalescing into the kind of life-affirming astral drone that would make The Necks proud—is one of the most powerful and absorbing tributes to another human you will ever hear.

As its name suggests, Elegies for the Drift is indeed a collection of five instrumental remembrances for people, times, and chances Westerlund has lost. It keys on two of Westerlund’s musical lodestars: Seaton and Milford Graves, the free jazz iconoclast who drew the young drummer to Vermont’s Bennington College before becoming his lifelong guide until he died only a week before Seaton. It also owes to Aaron Efird, the father of Westerlund’s longtime partner, Carson, who died after an extended illness in April 2022.

Perhaps more important, though, Elegies is an exquisite index of the inspiration these people collectively offered Westerlund. Unapologetically opinionated and aggressively charismatic, Seaton, Graves, and Efird all gave the perennially polite native Midwesterner more courage to be himself, the very kind of confidence he’d need to pour out his emotions for the audience of an audio engineer. It is a wordless thank-you letter, a heartfelt transmission from a season of sadness.

For the last three years especially, so many of us have wrestled with notions of what we’re supposed to do with all this grief. That is, how do we use it? Timely, pacific, and vital, Elegies for the Drift shapes such grief into a kind of sanctuary, a healing place where we can sit with our feelings and then move forward with them.

Westerlund’s Elegies first stemmed from a spell of general, non-specific grief. Early into lockdowns, Carson co-founded a regular online meditation group, the participants finding new ways to share space and time. One regular always played soft music in the background; clipped, bent, and warped by the software, the sounds seemed to shower the group in spectral magic, incidental music that reassured everyone while reminding them of what they had lost. In turn, Westerlund began to process his own drums and metallophones, vocal hums and distended synths, creating a little chamber ensemble for one of once-familiar, now-disembodied sounds. There is a sweet sadness to the resulting “Transference,” the feeling that comes as you watch a frown slowly transform into a smile.

The bulk of Elegies, however, comes from very specific grief, captured almost in real time. Westerlund built “Prelude to Quietude” as a loving lullaby for his then-ailing father-in-law, Aaron, decorating the piece’s prancing meter with the mesmerizing glow of gamelan. Rhythms move in a half-dozen directions, a knowing pas de deux with death that also tries to outmaneuver it.

And just five months after Seaton and Graves died in February 2021, Westerlund visited Kinshasa, the bustling Congolese capital, to see his extended family and play with the legendary Kasai Allstars for an afternoon. Such a hardscrabble and intense city would have previously terrified Westerlund, but he conjured the power of Seaton and Graves, people who loved to square up to uncertainty, to face off with the unknown. “Carolina Yin” and “Kinshasa Yang” mine the tension between who we are and who we might be, moving from the former’s peaceful haze of mbiras and bells to the latter’s kinetic playground of balafons, cymbals, and electronics. These tandem works are testaments to slipping among seemingly oppositional frames of mind, to holding onto yourself while trying on something new, too.

It is almost shockingly easy to find points of inspiration in our times of ceaseless content churn. Turn on a podcast or sample from an infinite scroll of documentaries or television streams—we are all looking to find the redemption in someone else’s saga, to mine it like a precious stone for our own fuel. But it is endlessly harder to actually do something with such inspiration, to internalize the insights of someone else’s toil, trouble, and occasional triumph enough to make you a better thinker, artist, or person.

Elegies for the Drift is proof that it can happen. Yes, three of the most vibrant, vital, and often brash people Westerlund ever met are now gone. But their sparks remain clear inside these five wonders, whether in the playfully gilded rhythms of “Prelude to Quietude” or the exquisite and inquisitive expanse of “The Circle.” You hear Westerlund’s heroes, trace their guiding light. Westerlund has never sounded so confident or so searching, so sure of what he wants to say about three people who inspired him to say anything at all. Elegies for the Drift, in the end, is exactly what we can do with grief—make something beautiful, so we can keep going ourselves.

-Grayson Haver Currin

CREDITS
Dedicated to Miles Cooper Seaton, Milford Graves and Aaron Hardwick Efird, and those who mentor by illuminating the direct path to ourselves.

Music by Joe Westerlund
The Circle is based on a vocal melody by Miles Cooper Seaton
Recorded, Mixed and Produced by Saman Khoujinian and Joe Westerlund
The Circle Recorded by Alli Rogers
Mastered by Chris Boerner
Sounds captured at Stoneycreek, Sahaja Space, Betty’s, and out in the world.

Joe Westerlund - Percussion, Electronics and Voice
with:
Miles Cooper Seaton - Voice on The Circle
Patrick Shiroishi - Clarinet on Carolina Yin
Trever Hagen - Trumpet on Kinshasa Yang
Libby Rodenbough - Violin on Transference

Cover collage by Joe Westerlund
Photo of Joe by Kendall Bailey
Layout/Design by Will Hackney

The following people greatly influenced the shape, meaning and existence of this record:
Miles, Milford, Aaron, Carson Efird, Martin Anderson, Grayson Currin, Leanne Pedante, John Colpitts, Alessandro Cau, M.Geddes Gengras, Akron/Family, Jake Meginsky, Kate Van Voorst and Hop(e)scotch, Music Festival, Saman, Alli, Trever, Libby, Patrick, Mopero Mupemba, Kabongo Tshisensa, Lukusa Ntazi, Ben Ilunga Muteba, Emily Westerlund, William Furahai Ilunga, Marc Hollander, Phil Moore, Justin Vernon, Ryan Olson, Brevan Hampden, Collective Care, the Tuesday Morning patrons, Clare Graham and MorYork, Nick Sanborn, Amelia Meath and the Betty’s/The Glow/Psychic Hotline family, and the Efirds and the Westerlunds.

"The Circle has no distinction
along it’s edge
No isolated points of focus
This is where giving and receiving
are one gesture
Both Yin and Yang
Inherent properties of each
within the other
They blur and swirl
in brief existence
inside The Circle, with no distinction"

If you need easing into the week then you're in luck, ambient stalwart Wil Bolton is back on the ever dependable Laaps Recordings with another enchanted soundscape that certainly echoes the LP title, where the sounds of barely bothered instruments & distant field recordings melt into the ambient ether to illusory utopian effect; but that's fine, it's OK to dream a little.

Wil Bolton is a London-based artist whose work uses synthesizers, guitars, acoustic instruments and effects to create warm and emotive melodies, fragmented and submerged among beds of droning ambient textures and environmental sounds.


Wil has released albums on labels including Home Normal, Hidden Vibes, Krysalisound, Audiobulb, Hibernate, Eilean Rec., Dronarivm and Sound In Silence. He has also shown his sound and video works in exhibitions at ICA, Incheon Art Platform, Liverpool Biennial and others, and has performed at venues including Cafe Oto, Tate Liverpool and Iklectik.


‘Like Floating Leaves’ was recorded January - July 2022 in East London, using modular synthesizers, Mellotron, Yamaha PSR-6, Waldorf Micro Q, Modal Argon8, OP-1, iPhone, glockenspiel, chimes, effects and field recordings from Venice, Stockholm, New York and Tokyo.

wilbolton.bandcamp.com/music
__________________________

CREDITS

Written, recorded and mixed by Wil Bolton in East London, January - July 2022.
Environmental sounds recorded in Venice, Stockholm, New York and Tokyo, 2014-2021.
_________

Mastered by Ian Hawgood
Artwork by Russell Burden
Design by Sprflxgrfzm

The new LP from Glinca sparkled a little brighter than the rest of Shimmering Mood's recent music deluge, certainly helped by the eye catching cover art by NagXX. Here Glinca strips things back to create an effervescent, futuristic ambient wonderland with that magical, twinkling, tonal modular synth sound that I never tire of, & which sounds wonderful reflecting off home walls on a lazy day.

"On Contemplation" is a concept album that explores the themes of introspection through some contemplation techniques.
Contemplation can lead to a change in state of consciousness, such a sense of calm, and a heightened awareness of one's thoughts, emotions, and surroundings.
The album's songs was all recorded right after my contemplation sessions just to catch the different state of consciousness produced.
All the tracks are made with a little modular system, often with no overdubs.

CREDITS
All tracks composed, recorded, mixed and mastered by Tazio Lacobacci
Artwork drawings by NagXX
Field Recording on Contemplation n.3 by Fenodyrie
Field Recording on Contemplation n.4 by inchadney

Shimmering Moods Records 2023
SHM 248