A CLOSER LISTEN weekly #53

Time Released Sound's new book, and many reviews

Dear Listeners. Joseph. Another week. Let’s get into it. I’m nearly done with the next episode of the Sound Propositions podcast, featuring Kerry O’Brien and William Robin talking about their anthology On Minimalism. That episode should be published sometime in the next week. But all of our posts in the last fortnight have been reviews. So this newsletter will feature an extra long selection of reviews, beginning with Richard Allen on Time Released Sound’s new book, A Decade of Handmade Music Packaging.

Time Released Sound ~ A Decade of Handmade Music Packaging

In 2012, Colin Herrick’s Time Released Sound was ACL’s very first Label of the Year.  We spotted the label right away, and have been fans ever since.  They’ve received a Best Packaging Award from us nearly every year the article has appeared, and we’ve reviewed approximately 30 of their releases, many also landing on year-end lists, the latest being Maud the Moth + trajedesaliva‘s Bordando el manto terrestre.  This last part is crucial, as it emphasizes the fact that Time Released Sound isn’t just a label whose packaging is exquisite, but a label with exquisite taste.

On a personal note, I own physical copies of about a third of TRS’ releases, many of which are all-time favorites, led by Plinth’s Collected Machine Music, one of the first albums we ever reviewed, set in a collaged chocolate box with an individual music box and punch strip that was different for every customer.  Other favorites include Monolyth & Cobalt’s Polarlicht, Enofa’s Arboretum and everything by Strië, who now records under her given name as Olga Wojciechowska.  But as many as I own, there are always others missing, including the other versions of the editions in my collection.  Time Released Sound: A Decade of Handmade Packaging allows fans to see all of the editions that were created before they were mailed all over the world: if not record covers, then cards and invitations.

Officially joined by designer Maria Chenut, Colin Herrick’s Time Released Sound now has the tribute it deserves – designed in-house, but professionally printed.  As Aquarius Records’ Andee Connors writes, TRS is one of those imprints that shouldn’t exist, but does: an obsessive labor of love that seems a last gasp against the onset of digital domination.  (I’ve also contributed a few words to the project, but had forgotten I had done so until my copy arrived!)

The basic premise of Time Released Sound is to release quality music in quality packaging, offering both regular and deluxe editions so that everyone can afford them.  Inside, one may find negatives, slides, clock dials, trading cards, puzzles, forest leaves, vials of metal or more.  Herrick and Chenut scour thrift shoppes and antique shows, collecting unique ephemera, often not knowing where they will assign them until inspiration arrives.  And of course there is the individual attention to detail, the hand-painted cover of the book’s deluxe edition only the most recent example.

The book – apart from being a celebration of the label – honors the art of inspiration, the creativity of collage, the charm of collection.  It’s also the best book of its type since Stuart Tolley’s Collector’s Edition: Innovative Packaging and Graphics (2014), the difference being that this is a monograph.  Each of the first hundred+ releases receives a two or more-page spread, the longer ones for those with multiple covers.  The book begins with testimonials and ends in a new interview.  It not only intrigues, but inspires; in the midst of reading, one starts to remember what ephemera one might have stashed around the house, and what one might create given the time and opportunity.

Then of course there is the music.  By this we mean the brand new music created to accompany this project: two discs (also available without the book) featuring two and a half hours of music from 36 TRL artists, inspired by the theme of time.  This is by any definition an amazing collection of (mostly) ambient music, bolstered by its unifying theme and overall quality.  The sequencing lends itself to a smooth listening experience (the occasional ticking a lovely reminder).  As these artists have contributed their finest work, it’s also the rare ambient album with standout tracks.

Maps and Diagrams starts the set with ticking clocks and ringing chimes, running water and a sense of flow (as Alan Parsons once sang, “time keeps flowing like a river to the sea”).  Ambient music is often said to suspend, distort or misdirect one’s experience of time, an effect duplicated across these discs.  The yearning strings of Olga Wojciechowska sing of distant lands lost and found, collapsing the time it takes to arrive.  In “Sisyphus Underwater,” Dalot stops and starts, a reminder of intervals.  The contrast between what is seemingly live and looped creates a feeling akin to jet lag: is this happening now?   Francisco Sonur sends his piece down the post-rock road, while other tracks, through use of piano and strings, border on modern composition.  Of these, Wilson Trouve‘s “Adagio (Quartet)” is particularly poignant.

Hoshiko Yamane leads off the second disc with what may be the best piece in the entire collection, “The Distance Between You, The Difference In Time,” building on the stringed template of Trouve.  The aching is palpable, conveyed not only through music but conversation and clock.  Like many of these tracks, it sends me back to look for the former TRS release, in this case Spaces In Between, recorded with Mikael Lind.  In Tristan Shorr (Gideon Wolf)‘s “Another Now,” ticks and tocks are transformed into beats, ravaging a post-apocalyptic landscape in which time has no meaning.  Wormwood‘s”Miandervane” starts in pitters and patterns and eventually becomes a storm.

On the one hand, the book is a trip down memory lane.  On another, the discs are a glimpse of the future.  Notions of time collide and coalesce.  The second hand spins and spins.  If you haven’t been part of the Time Released Sound experience until now, this is a wonderful time to jump on, and if you’re already a fan, this keepsake edition will become a treasured part of your collection, worth owning, worth sharing with others and worth returning to for years to come!  

Read on the blog.

RECENT REVIEWS

Reviews are at the heart of ACL. Breaking format a bit, here are (slightly longer excerpts from) a few of my favorite reviews we posted on the blog in the last few weeks.

Jaime del Adarve ~ Las Horas
The pairing of painting and music makes this a special little release.  The cover art comes from the Barcelona-based artist’s aunt, Conchi Escamilla, the internal art from a pair of other local artists, Adolfo Lozano Sidro and Snorri Arinbjarnar.  We miss the days of vinyl, because the hues here are particularly vibrant, a match for the tender, emotive music.

This is the second EP for composer Jaime del Adarve, following last year’s Neu, also on piano and coffee records.  Las Horas (The Hours) may refer to the hours of the day, although the EP can be played five times over the course of an hour; “Las Amanecida” recalls the dawn, while “La Quietud” suggests the winding down of the day.  The overall theme is a celebration of “goddesses on earth” ~ the women who birthed and watched over us.  The woman on the right of the cover even appears to have celestial wings.

piano and coffee records is geared up for a great year, and this is a subtle yet fantastic start.  Their second release of the year arrives only a week after this one; stay tuned for more

Klangriket & Sjors Mans ~ Origami Birds
The sweet story of Sadako Sasaki and 1000 origami birds is translated to music and poem by Klangriket & Sjors Mans.  First popularized in the book Sadoko and the Thousand Paper Cranes, the tale of a Holocaust survivor attempting to complete the project before dying of radiation has touched many a heart and become a metaphor for peace. Fabian Rosenberg (Klangriket)’s poem is read in two languages by three generations of women, connecting the line back to its genesis, while a string quartet suffuses the tale with an additional melancholic hue.

In Origami Birds, Klangriket & Sjors Mans bring new attention to an old tale, illustrating it with sound rather than image.  One can already imagine the stage play.  Their partnership has made incredible strides since The Amsterdam Sessions, one of piano and coffee records’ first releases.  This is one of the label’s finest albums to date.

Li Yilei ~ NONAGE
It’s hard to resist an album with track titles such as “Pond, Grief and Glee” and “Sand, Fable and Tiger Balm.”  Such titles hearken back to childhood while honoring the power of three.  Li Yilei uses childhood instruments ~ some irrevocably broken, such as bird whistles, an old accordion, a music box and a toy piano ~ to revisit, and perhaps reevaluate a period known as nonage.  The word refers to the time frame in which a Chinese child’s “hair is let down” and they are encouraged to experiment: a time that passes all too quickly, is replaced by vast expectation, and often takes a lifetime to rediscover.  Thankfully, Li Yilei has been able to do so here.  One can hear the curiosity as the artist holds old, cherished instruments, wondering what secrets they may whisper about identity, reality and the soul of objects.

Lisa Ullén ~ Heirloom
In Heirloom, Lisa Ullén moves between worlds and, doing so, disproves several commonplace fallacies. Take note of the cover image, shown [above]: it’s important.
[…] The cover art of Heirloom is the small box of possessions that Ullén brought to Sweden as a child adoptee from South Korea. Ullen writes:

This is music that stems from an experience of not really belonging to anything, of being in between identities and traditions; music that makes use of melodic and rhythmical fragments but refuses to settle within expressions that already exist, and instead lets the music have several layers where different textures and rhythms pass through each other.

This, then, is music about identity, but in its complexity, its coincidences and its contradictions, changes and consistencies, it is surely one of most honest and realistic musical depictions of human identity ever created.

Maya Shenfeld ~ Under the Sun
Under the Sun is a study in contrasts: the way things are and the way things could be.  Even the internal dynamics shift beneath the ears, from seismic drone to effervescent electronics, from oboe and recorders to organ and choir.  While grounded, the album also travels into space.  The fact that it holds together so well is a testament to the vision of Maya Shenfeld, who has produced a remarkable statement, championing diversity through diversity. Shenfeld is nothing if not hopeful.  She envisions a future of collaboration and cooperation, in contrast to popular prognostications.  By quoting the words of the prophet Ecclesiastes (“There is nothing new under the sun”), she both exposes and challenges assumptions. In the end, the drone attempts to swallow the choir, but fails.  The signal outlasts the noise.  May this vision become a reality.

Neil Cowley ~ Building Blocks, Pt. 6
In between albums (2021’s Hall of Mirrors and 2023’s fantastic Battery Life – read our review) Neil Cowley has been releasing a series of EPs called Building Blocks, the final part of which is released this week.

Cowley is a fascinating genre-bender, bringing together electronic and contemporary classical with the inevitable jazz influences of someone who had a jazz trio for more than a decade, and listening to the complete set of Building Block EPs is a wonderful journey. The two albums mentioned above are a bit more coherent than the EP set but that’s exactly the point: these EPs are made up of experiments, ideas that were worthy of being developed into complete pieces but didn’t fit into the grander album form. It is fascinating to consider what would have happened if Cowley had pursued one of the experiments further, developing it into a full album.

As such Cowley’s Building Blocks are a fascinating contrast to Lisa Ullén’s Heirloom, which we reviewed last week. Ullén’s music deliberately blends genre traits until they lose their meaning—and that’s precisely her purpose. By contrast Cowley uses genres, raising them up one by one to compare them, like a child examining building blocks to order to understand how they work. In doing so he invests genre with more meaning. Similar techniques, totally different outcomes.

Building Blocks proves once again that Cowley is that rarest of gift: a genuine intellectual with a practical goal, creating music with an immediate appeal that belies its subtle depth.

Wound ~ Plasticene

This cassette has me thinking a lot about plastic, not only because the tape is about plastic, but because it’s released in a plastic shell.  Plasticene is one of three releases from the brand new okla records, based in Krakow, and leaving nothing to chance, Wound is the pseudonym for founder Bartosz Szturgiewicz.  The label is currently accepting demos, but don’t expect this window to last for long as folks will soon discover a great new home for leftfield music!

Wound’s music, a blend of ambient and electronic, was once thought futuristic, but today this futurism has soured into consumerism.  The hint of electric organ sings of “real” things copied, plasticized.  “Sefing on Mars” is an amusing title, as SEFING is the company behind the metal and thermoplastic polyurethane cases for iPhones.  The word is close to “selfie,” and one can imagine a modern visitor to Mars taking a selfie and leaving the case behind.  Not that we’re any stranger to space pollution; the new shooting stars are pieces of discarded devices orbiting our atmosphere.

Various Artists ~ Inner Demons Batch 2024A
You’d have to be absolute batshit crazy to release 19 drone and noise-based CD-Rs on the same day, much less Valentine’s Day, but this is exactly what Tampa’s Inner Demons Records has done.  But flip the script and it makes a strange kind of sense; Ash Wednesday also falls on Valentine’s Day this year: the first day of Lent, when Christians remember Jesus being driven into the desert to wrestle with his own demons, inner and outer.  These recordings, filled with a sense of real danger, make a much more suitable soundtrack than placid organ hymns.  As evidence, spin the “first” of the nineteen by number, Fabio Keiner‘s Battle Hymn, which reimagines the hymn in a dark yet respectful manner, freed from political bandying, once again a diatribe against slavery and its insidious tendrils of racism.  The struggle is apparent in the density, which lifts momentarily in “Let Us Die to Make All Free,” an opportunity for reflection.  All too often the hymn is sung as if all foes have been vanquished, when the lyrics clearly state that they have not.

There’s a lot more worth discovering in this batch: a diatribe against political repression in Russia, a reimagining of the score to “The Fall of the House of Usher,” a pair of disturbing compositions to help disturbed people sleep, and an overall variety of dark timbres on 17 CD3″s and 2 CD5″s, at a ridiculously low price ~ only $1 each for the digital EPs.  Is it enough to drive out inner demons? Perhaps for a night, and if so, that is enough

UPCOMING RELEASES

(complete list with Bandcamp links here)

David Aubrey’s photo of crocuses in snow sums up this point in the season.  While any day may bring clouds and storms, there’s no stopping the spring. After one of the quietest musical winters in recent memory, we’ve seen a rush of spring submissions, already totaling over a hundred.  Whether you’re already warm or stuck in the cold, there is always something new on the horizon.  New previews are added to this page daily; we hope that you will find your next favorite album right here!

AFM ~ Mille Mondi (CEE, 22 February)

Petar Klanac ~ Sept cordes (22 February)

Adam Howse ~ Submarine (okla, 23 February)

Ali Khan | Yoyu | Lynx ~ it’s all gonna be okay somehow (Intraset, 23 February)

Andrew Land ~ And All of This (Bigo & Twigetti, 23 February)

Aviva Endean | Henrik Olsson ~ Split Series Vol. 2 (FRIM, 23 February)

Ben Peers ~ Solo Drum Machine (Elli, 23 February)

Bruno Duplant ~ du silence des anges (Moving Furniture, 23 February)

David Grubbs & Liam Keenan ~ Your Music Encountered in a Dream (Room40, 23 February)

Demetrio Cecchitelli ~ Unity (rohs!, 23 February)

Drifting in Silence ~ Winters Past (Labile, 23 February)

Eric Hilton ~ Sound Vagabond (23 February)

EYOT ~ Quindecennial (23 February)

Giacomo Vanelli ~ Music for Nothing (okla, 23 February)

Gregory Uhlmann ~ Small Day (Colorfield, 23 February)

Jaime del Adarve ~ Las Horas (piano and coffee records, 23 February)

Jordan Tarento ~ Lattices (Earshift Music, 23 February)

Kim Myhr & Kitchen Orchestra ~ Hereafter (Sofa, 23 February)

Marco Paltrinieri ~ Rapari Minimi (Canti Magnetici, 23 February)

Maya Shenfeld ~ Under the Sun (Thrill Jockey, 23 February)

MINING ~ Chimet (Leaf, 23 February)

Site Nonsite ~ The Japan Series (23 February)

Site Nonsite ~ Remixed (23 February)

Wound ~ Plasticene (okla, 23 February)

Wrecked Lightship ~ Antiposition (peak oil, 23 February)

Lihla ~ Socha (A Strangely Isolated Place, 24 February)

Mark David Hadley ~ Homegrown Apples (Whitelabrecs, 24 February)

Earth Tongues ~ Anemone (Neither/Nor, 25 February)

Gonçalo Almeida and Pierre Bastien ~ Dialogues and Shadows (Futura Resistenza, 27 February)

Limpe Fuchs ~ Pianoon (Futura Resistenza, 27 February)

The Humble Bee & Offthesky ~ Here In, Absence (IIKKI, 29 February)

Amaro Freitas ~ Y’Y (Psychic Hotline, 1 March)

Cameron Lindy ~ Ghost Frequency II: Resonance (Earshift Music, 1 March)

cerrot ~ Butterfly Effect (trip recordings, 1 March)

The Corrupting Sea ~ Cold Star: an homage to Tangelos (Somewherecold, 1 March)

Cyclopean Forge ~ Blood Under the Glass (1 March)

Domenic Cappello ~ Basement Philosophy (Alien Communications, 1 March)

Duncan Blachford ~ Ill-Prepared Piano (Endless Melt, 1 March)

Eva Novoa ~ Novoa / Gress / Gray Trio, Vol. 1 (577 Records, 1 March)

Horse Lords: As It Happened: Horse Lords Live (RVNG, 1 March)

Jack Silverman Quartet ~ Prince of Shadows (Centripetal Force, 1 March)

Je Est Une Autre ~ Flatworm Mysticism (Cestrum Nocturnum, 1 March)

Jeremy Rose & the Earshift Orchestra ~ Discordia (Earshift Music, 1 March)

Joel Roston ~ We’re Able (1 March)

Jörgen Gustafsson ~ a darkened harbor (Ombrelle Concrète, 1 March)

Leonidas & Hobbes ~ Pockets of Light (Hobbes Music, 1 March)

Li Jianhong ~ Soul Solitary (Ramble, 1 March)

Ludwig Wittbrodt ~ Schleifen (Ana Ott, 1 March)

Matteo Cambò ~ Paradoxum (L’Archipel Nocturne, 1 March)

Michaël Attias ~ Quartet Music Vol. I: LuMiSong (Out of Your Head, 1 March)

Muddersten ~ Triple Music (Sofa Music, 1 March)

Niels Lyhne Løkkegaard & Quatuor Bozzini ~ Colliding Bubbles (Important Records, 1 March)

NPVR ~ 33 34 (Editions Mego, 1 March)

nubo ~ Planetary Vision (Western Vinyl, 1 March)

Sarah Belle Reid ~ MASS (Extended + Remastered) (1 March)

sinonó ~ la espalda y su punto radiante (Subtext, 1 March)

Squarepusher ~ Dostrotime (Warp, 1 March)

Staś Czekalski ~ Przygody (Mondoj, 1 March)

Valerie Ace ~ Stress & Stress (Intrepid Skin, 1 March)

Various Artists ~ Future Sounds of Kraut Vol. 2 (Compost, 1 March)

David Shea ~ The Ship (Room40, 2 March)

Yes Indeed ~ King of Blue (meakusma, 6 March)

Li Yilei ~ NONAGE (Metron, 6 March)

Bauer + Katharina Schmidt ~ Open Water (Moon Villain, 7 March)

Aiden Baker ~ Pithovirii (Glacial Movement, 8 March)

Billy Bultheel ~ Two Cycles (PAN, 8 March)

Chatte Royale ~ Mick Torres Plays Too F**Iing Loud (Kapitaen Platte, 8 March)

Dabrye ~ Super-Cassette (Ghostly International, 8 March)

Doc Sleep ~ Cloud Sight Fade (Dark Entries, 8 March)

Eva Maria-Houben + John Hudak ~ Paloma Wind (LINE, 8 March)

Hanno Leichtmann / Valerio Tricoli ~ Cinnte le Dia (NI VU NI CONNU, 8 March)

HJirok ~ S/T (Altin Village & Mine, 8 March)

Marta Forsberg ~ Sjunger För Varandra (Warm Winters Ltd., 8 March)

Naum Gabo ~ F. Lux (8 March)

Nexcyia ~ Endless Path of Memory (Pensaments Sonics, 8 March)

Shabason / Gunning ~ Ample Habitat (Seance Centre, 8 March)

TVSI ~ Mediterraneo (Nervous Horizon, 8 March)

UFO95 ~ Backward Improvement (Tresor, 8 March)

Federico Ughi et al ~ Infinite Cosmos Calling You, You, You (577 Records, 9 March)

AnD ~ When Stars Collide (Instruments of Discipline, 11 March)

Stumpf ~ Sand (Edelfaul, 12 March)

Banku ~ Split (Everybody In, 15 March)

Celer ~ Engaged Touches (Expanded and Remastered) (15 March)

Elayn ~ Enhiar (Manjam, 15 March)

Janek van Laak ~ Circle of Madness (Sonar Kolletkif, 15 March)

Kane Pour ~ The Last Wave (sound as language, 15 March)

Mattia Onori ~ Tra Vento E Oscurità (Southern Lights, 15 March)

Michael Vincent Waller ~ Moments Remixes (Play Loud, 15 March)

NAH ~ Totally Recalled (15 March)

Rafi Garabedian ~ The Crazy Dog (15 March)

Viv Corringham ~ Soundwalkscapes (Flaming Pines, 15 March)

Vladamir Dubyshkin ~ Ivanovo night luxe (trip recordings, 15 March)

a. brehme ~ peaou001 (peaou, 16 March)

Adrian Lane ~ Vignettes (Whitelabrecs, 16 March)

Andrew Heath & Mi Cosa de Resistance ~ Café Tristesse (Audiobulb, 16 March)

Low Altitude ~ Boat (Whitelabrecs, 16 March)

Liberski/Yoshida ~ Troubled Water (Totalism, 21 March)

Ben Chatwin ~ Verdigris (Disinter, 22 March)

Christopher Hoffman ~ Vision is the Identity (Out of Your Head, 22 March)

Colin Johnco ~ Crabe Géant (Johnkôôl, 22 March)

Ian Carey & Wood Metal Plastic ~ Strange Arts (Slow & Steady, 22 March)

julien bayle ~ Attractors (Elli, 22 March)

julien bayle ~ void propagate (Elli, 22 March)

LFZ ~ Raveled Veiled Known (22 March)

Magic Tuber Stringband ~ Needlefall (Thrill Jockey, 22 March)

Menchaca/Noga ~ Activity of Sound (22 March)

MIZU ~ Forest Scenes (NNA Tapes, 22 March)

Ogive ~ Opalecentia (Room40, 22 March)

Ohr Hiemis, Augustin Braud ~ Opal Spine (Wic Records, 22 March)

Ryan Teague ~ Pattern Recognition (Bigo & Twigetti, 22 March)

SAICOBAB ~ NRTYA (Thrill Jockey, 22 March)

Stefan Goldmann ~ Expanse (Macro, 22 March)

Aron Porteleki ~ Smearing (blindblindblind, 23 March)

Thanos Fotiadis ~ The Hope Realm (Esc.rec., 23 March)

Aptøsrs ~ Elders (SkyBaby, 29 March)

Arushai Jain ~ Delight (Leaving, 29 March)

Ayumi Ishito ~ Roboquarians, Vol. 1 (577 Records, 29 March)

Carme López ~ Quintela (Warm Winters Ltd., 29 March)

Chelidon Frame ~ Flatline Voyages (Difficult Art & Music, 29 March)

CLARAGULAR ~ Figura (Lapsus, 29 March)

De Beren Gieren ~ What Eludes Us (Sdban, 29 March)

Farah Kaddour ~ Badā (Asadan Alay, 29 March)

Franck Vigroux ~ Grand Bal (Cyclic Law, 29 March)

Gabriel Vicéns ~ Mural (29 March)

Jinjé ~ Escape from Luna (Mesh, 29 March)

o k h o ~ GROUP 1 (29 March)

Stuart Argabright & AfterAfter ~ LA Drones (Room40, 29 March)

Willy Rodriguez ~ Seeing Sounds (29 March)

Jacob Parke ~ Space Cadet 64 – World Record Nintendogs + Cats Speedrun July 17 (1 April)

Chris P. Thompson ~ Stay the Same (4 April)

A Lily ~ Saru I-Qamar (Phantom Limb, 5 April)

Jonny Halifax Indignation ~ Açid Blüüs Räägs Vol.2 (God Unknown, 5 April)

Josh Johnson ~ Unusual Object (Northern Spy, 5 April)

Matthew Shipp Trio ~ New Concepts in Piano Trio Jazz (ESP-Disc’, 5 April)

missing scenes ~ who is this for? (Varia, 5 April)

sleepmakeswaves ~ It’s Here, But I Have No Name for It (5 April)

Ulrich Krieger ~ Aphotic III: Bathyal (Room40, 5 April)

[Ahmed] ~ Wood Blues (fönstret, 8 April)

SPECIO ~ S/T (Prohibited, 11 April)

Caroline Davis & Wendy Eisenburg ~ Accept When (Astral Spirits, 12 April)

Ciro Vitiello ~ The Island of Bouncy Memories (Haunter, 12 April)

Ghost Trees ~ Intercept Method (12 April)

Griffure ~ Paratonnerre (Umlaut, 12 April)

Pinkcourtesyphone ~ Arise in Sinking Feeling (Room40, 12 April)

Rejoicer ~ This Is Reasonable (Circus Company, 12 April)

9T Antiope ~ Horror Vacui (American Dreams, 12 April)

Teiku ~ S/T (577 Records, 12 April)

Stefan Goldmann ~ Alluvium (Macro, 15 April)

Silvia Bolognesi / Dudú Kouate / Griffin Rodriguez ~ Timing Birds (Astral Spirits, 16 April)

Calum Builder ~ Renewal Manifestation (Dacapo, 19 April)

Innode ~ grain (Editions Mego, 19 April)

Kelpe ~ LP10 (Kit Records, 19 April)

Noémi Büchi ~ Does It Still Matter (~OUS, 24 April)

Meat Beat Manifesto & Merzbow ~ Extinct (Cold Spring, 26 April)

Montgomery & Turner ~ Sound Is (Our) Sustenance (Astral Editions, 26 April)

SticklerPhonics ~ Technicolor Ghost Parade (Jealous Butcher, 3 May)