rabbitspeech (cdr - absurd #19)

if i was ever to describe april 02 then guess gx jupitter larsen's 'but unemployment is the answer' fits best. having quit my previous job 1 month earlier after some hard workin times was spending a period of creative enthusiasm. so when stylianos tziritas called and dropped the idea for a duo w/ thodoris zioutos and a possible trio w/ labros stemnis on live video mix all 3 we jumped maniacally on the idea.

both dates in small music theatre in late april 02 are still memorable to all of us. a haunting atmosphere which although i can't re-enact here at least you can get an idea of it listening to the document.





it was one of the first times also that labros stemnis surprised us using as source surveilance video tapes that were lifted from a friend of his back then. he would surprise us in the future with 2 other memorable videos. one where the performer of it begs naked on a pedestrian road asking the people to touch his cock, in the end shits and eats his own shit and one year later in the art athina during the 'pagan' theme where the same performer dimitris ... self whipped himself and in the end the audience was allowed to whip him if they wished too. he managed to crash for sometime in the news. but that's another story that happened later than those 2 early days.


rabbitspeech

larry gus 'iasmos' cdr (oko records #1)

larry gus is another luminary of the greek electronica scene. by the time you think you know almost everything 'bout sound he surprises you playing in a completely different mood. but what i love the most besides his music is the enthusiasm we share for reading.
so much that to this day is the only guy from greece that has discovered out of which thomas pynchon book i picked up the 'noise a few decks below' quote to use as a name for absurd's site www.noise-below.org back in june 06 that it was launched.




but to 'iasmos'... it was orion's 2nd birthday that was coming for his 1st we had issued the kiwako kaneda 'cake of sea' cd and for the 2nd we wanted (as usual)a live set of someone who likes children and fancies playing music with them. having issued 'infant' a few months before it was arranged in december 07 for tasos stamou to perform in april in iasmos (the village were children parties are usually held). luckily stamou completely out of the blue pissed us off some 3 weeks before the party but lucky enough larry was doing his military service in the city of xanthi at the time so we picked him up for the party. the result of which is documented on this cdr a part of which uses the live extracts and another part is studio recordings that were added later. issued on a sleeve that is meant to be a train with larry gus being the conductor and us the humble 'musciians' following his instructions! should you wish a sleeve to make your own copy (as we still have plenty of them) just request yours here




join the musical express of iasmos!

tasos stamou 'infant' CD (editions_zero #15)

i met tasos stamou for the first time sometime in november 06 in athens, it was a couple of weeks before that he participated in a gig organized by the early noise-below hybrid (hosted back then on www.void.gr server & being absurd's & related activities official site), in late october 06 with valerio tricoli that was held in zenit club in thessaloniki. till then i was unaware of his existence or his work and it was kostis kilimis (of organized music from thessaloniki / noise-below administrator) that introduced me to it. a mix of electronica, circuit bending, experimentation at least those words come now in mind to describe the feelings of the first listens i did to his work. it didn't take long to come up with a cd idea assembling various pieces he did and span a period of some 6 months between oct 06 to early /mid 07. so sometime in mid/late 07 the cd was out on editions_zero numbered as edition_zero #15 to play w/ absurd's sacred number and a booklet that was assembled of images like teddy bears, dragons, balloons images that deal with absurd's cosmology. a print run of 500 housed in a knitting image kit. actually some 420 or 430 were made as we didn't have enough knitting sets. (some 70 of the cds were recently recycled during a special destructive set too so let's say that 400 cds exist, mention so for the completists).
so here are sounds to make you feel like a child that discovers the universe.

infant

sudden infant / bill kouligas split cdr (absurd 64)

can't recall how the idea was dropped guess must have been during a maelstrom of emails exchange with bill or something like that the thing is it happened, with artwork, package designed and done by bill being one of his first solo recordings (well the family battle snake saga was at its outbreak at the time) and was ready just at the time for 06's atp fest.

i know that today bill's side might not be as great as it first sounded as he has progressed a lot but still love it and gotta admit that am dying for the sudden infant side for me stands as one of joke's finest moments, download play loud and share the enthusiasm!

sibk

imca 'imca' CD (absurd #62)

i love this record. i trully love this record. if i was ever to describe to someone my feelings about the (tape & not) network as i lived in my teens circa 89-approx 94 during a trully turbulent period then it would be this record nowadays of course some more but guess this one is of those that could be described as all in one. or something like that. it reminds me of my first steps in the world of obsucre musics, one of the first korm plastics catalogues i received back then and the flyer announcement for the imca lp limited to 77 copies that due to stupidity didn't buy then and luckily purchased a few years back from RRR via an ebay auction, etc..


guess also is freek kinkelaar's vital weekly review that fits best as well to the case so i paste the review / press info for it.


I have to admit that I have a love-hate relation with this album. I love the
way this album was made. It represents a somewhat bygone musical age, a time
with cassettes and without e-mail, when things worked perhaps slower, but
perhaps also more intensely. The full story of how the IMCA project
(International Musique Concrete Ensemble) came together is told in detail in
the CD booklet. In short, in 1990 Frans de Waard started a mail
collaboration with John Hudak and Jos Smolders for a cassette on Midas
Music, and later a second one with Guido Huebner (of Das Synthetisches
Mischgewebe), Ios Smolders and Isabelle Chemin, which was the LP released by
Korm Plastics. The basic soundmaterial (created by De Waard) was mailed to
the first recipient who would rework the material and mail it to the next
recipient etcetera. Thus a network chain was born. The results were released
on the original IMCA album, which came on glorious white vinyl and contained
an explanatory booklet. The vinyl edition consisted of 98 copies; 77 of
these were for the public, 21 for the makers, resulting in the fact that
many people knew about it, but only a few actually heard the music. I
remember I was supposed to help gluing the covers, but I can't remember if I
did in the end. I was given a free copy, so perhaps I did. I love the way
this re-release is presented; an old tattered cover of the LP was used for
this CD, which gives it a nice archival touch. The booklet is well-designed
(by Meeuw), contains some of the original notes and explains the recording
process in detail. But now to the music: IMCA is not easy listening, it is
in fact a very demanding, electro-acoustic record with extreme dynamics.
These dynamics were a bit lost on the original pressing on vinyl, but due to
Jos Smolder's remastering these are back in place, which means you'll get to
hear the IMCA ensemble as it was meant to be heard. The opening track of the
CD still gives me a headache: high pitched feedback shrieks close to the
level of irritation. It's hard to listen to this without turning the volume
down. Luckily the electro-acoustic/musique concret of IMCA becomes more
listenable after the challenging intro. The often dry sounds (dry as in
untreated") are combined with long silences, with, at times, sudden blasts
of concrete noise. Most of the used sounds seem to have their origin in
noise (musique concret) rather than a musical source. Despite the many hands
at the wheel of this album, the results are strangely coherent, which is a
complement to those involved. In total 10 tracks are indexed, even though
it's hard to tell where one ends and the other one begins. IMCA is probably
best enjoyed in one long listening session in the right frame of mind. The
final 2 tracks, which make up for the final 30 minutes of this CD, feature
side A and B from the Midas cassette version with contributions from John
Hudak. Here the sound is more traditional industrial if you like, with
rhythms and a bit of a Nurse With Wound touch. Not bad at all. This is an
important archive release of an album made by adventurous musicians who
actually live up to their name. Like back in 1991, I'm not sure if it's
musically a classic, but I am very happy to have this in my collection. (FK)

still have copies if anyone interested for a physical copy. trades are more than welcome as always just drop a line here

enjoy!

imca

leif elggren '45 minutes from underneath the beds'

one of my absurd faves... better say the release that blasted the 'research center for the definition of happiness' series back in early 00's and the circular sleeves idea. perhaps that's the reason why i love it more than others as reminds a crazy period out of which was born this series.

the initial sleeve was grey w/ grey lettering influenced by kazimir malevich's works and was accidentally decided when back in 01 i was at maya lavda's office working on ideas for it and how to emerge the circular covers series, etc...

a couple of years later while sons of god were in greece to perform in small music theatre was dropped the idea of reissuing it in 2006 to celebrate absurd's 10th birthday and almost 3 years afterwards on 15th of august 2006 as sugar bar in stockholm was held the re-release party (& absurd's birthday party too). this time on the utan titel label w/ a new sleeve / artwork plus 6 new tracks for the cd reissue.

but guess i talked already too much... better let the sounds speak for themselves...

leif elggren

absurd #6 (research center for the definition of happiness samothrace branch)(2001, athens, greece)

utan titel #6 (2006, stockholm, sweden)

45 minutes from underneath the beds

earzumba 'vivo!' (hrysalida #1)

that came accidentally almost a year after the release of 'real ruido pastizo' the actual plan was a secret gig and a secret dj set on the birthday of a friend in xanthi in early december 2008. dropped a line to christian if he liked the idea and he was for it. arranged everything, the dj set of our friend christos karras (former editor of the 'overdub' fanzine) arranged with the bar 'kokori' in xanthi however due to lack of space we couldn't work out the gig so we split this memorable event in 2 places. the earzumba live set and the city's folk museum and the dj set in the bar.

as a result is this cdr issued on hrysalida (the disguise under which events are held in the city of xanthi) including sets from 3 live sets and various dates at m.a.m.b.a. in buenos aires, argentina, fluc, wien, austria and folk museum, xanthi, greece.

enjoy the atmosphere!

vivo!

earzumba

earzbuma 'real ruido pastizo' (editions_zero #13 2007)

it was a metamkine update that jerome was saying the best for the first 2 earzumba cds, purchased them freaked out and wrote to christian dergarabedian a.k.a. earzumba for more infos. turned to a cdr proposal and christian made a pure freaky soundtrack as if spewn from a 60's/70's spaggheti, crime, whatever film!

real ruido pastizo

for infos on earzumba check here

regarding track 7 here's more info on bernard hermann and silvestre revueltas