I just received this gorgeous screen print from Glass Siren Studios – check out their site for more amazing designs – not sure how many colours this is but it’s a work of art.
Coming at the end of August from Ghost Box – reminds me of the 60s sci-fi Penguin covers of Franco Grignani
I can’t recommend these highly enough, and all for free until the 26th!
Available 23rd-26th June 2016 to mark the Kosmischer Läufer Exhibition at Leith Late Arts Festival.
This three track sampler contains one song from each of the first three volumes of Kosmischer Läufer. The music was recorded by Martin Zeichnete in secret for the East German Olympic Programme in the 70’s and 80’s.
‘Zeit zum Laufen 172’ is a warmup track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume Two.
‘Die lange Gerade’ is a edited version of running track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume One.
‘Für Seelenbinder’ is a warmdown track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume Three.The full albums are available at Bandcamp and on all digital platforms.
Find out more about Martin Zeichnete and his work at kosmischerlaufer.com
This three track sampler contains one song from each of the first three volumes of Kosmischer Läufer. The music was recorded by Martin Zeichnete in secret for the East German Olympic Programme in the 70’s and 80’s.
‘Zeit zum Laufen 172’ is a warmup track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume Two.
‘Die lange Gerade’ is a edited version of running track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume One.
‘Für Seelenbinder’ is a warmdown track originally released on Kosmischer Läufer Volume Three.The full albums are available at Bandcamp and on all digital platforms.
Find out more about Martin Zeichnete and his work at kosmischerlaufer.com
Zeit zum Laufen!
Just a quick reminder; Jonny Trunk and I, this Saturday, Rat Records, Camberwell, London, SE5, 1.30 onwards…. FREE!
Last week, DJ‘s Cheeba & Moneyshot finished their deconstruction of Beck’s album, ‘Odelay’, which celebrated it’s 20th anniversary on June 18th. As he plays Glastonbury this coming weekend, Solid Steel will premiere the mix on Friday 24th, entitled, ‘Yo! Delay’. A long time in the making, it’s over an hour of the LP broken down into samples, interview snippets, scratch routines and more, in the same way our ‘Caught In The Middle of a Three-Way Mix’ did with the Beastie Boys’ ‘Paul’s Boutique’ a few years back.
Lucky enough to hear it before the public, I stuck it on and we had a message session via Facebook, below are some of my (edited) comments as I listened for the first time…
you get a Devil’s Haircut acappella?
is that the Stones with the guitar riff?
mad JB cover there
I reckon Beck might thank you for not putting the track list out there
This is great guys
oh that New Pollution sax break is great
Oh Lee Michaels! – you have that album? Killer
I hope you got Mantronix into Where It’s At?
There she blows!
hairs on the back of the neck moment
Anyone ever do a porno with whales called ‘There she blows’ Roy?
ah this is f**king great guys, I’m grinning
This extended freakout bit with samples and spoken cuts is redefining the mix guys – insane
oh! Dick Hyman!
f**k guys, mix of the year so far
A few people are going to have their dreams shattered though – “I thought Beck wrote that!”
make a little commentary to go with it, the first real time mix commentary – you could break down what you did?
Well, guys – mix of the year so far, you nailed it, didn’t want it to end – well done
My latest Freaky Formats piece for The Vinyl Factory just went up – this time it’s about holograms on both records and their sleeves, I even sneaked a CD in. 
Several boxes were ticked last Monday night when I was invited to Abbey Road Studios in North London to feature on a panel to talk about Star Wars and its influence on music over the last near 40 years. It was part of the launch of a new vinyl edition of the soundtrack to Star Wars: The Force Awakens, complete with holographic Tie Fighters and Millennium Falcons etched into the surface of the two discs by Tristan Duke.
Journalist Andrew Harrison (Your Empire Needs You T-shirt) chaired a small panel of myself, Tristan Duke (peeking over my shoulder) – the man responsible for the holograms, and Alex Milas (centre back, editor of Metal Hammer magazine and life-long SW fan). After plenty of nerdy fan banter two First Order Storm Troopers strode in to deliver the LP to Tristan who then played it as it was projected onto the screen above. Food was served, vinyl was cooed over, photos were taken with Storm Troopers and much was discussed of a fanboy nature.
A few days later I took on trying to capture the holograms from my vinyl copy at home. This was easily achieved with just direct sunlight or you can use a torch or lamp in dark conditions. This is what the hologram looks like in normal light (above) and this is what it looks like when having direct light pointed at it (below)
The LP sleeve is printed on thick mirror board card which makes the star field sparkle when light hits it and the cover logo is embossed. It’s a beautiful package that Disney/Universal have really gone the extra length to get looking and feeling special. There’s also a 16 page 12″-sized booklet with a forward by JJ Abrams and stills from the film.
It’s released worldwide on Friday, June 17th.
On the panel I remarked on how the new release is so like the original OST in layout – minimal and tasteful. That made be want to dig out my 1977 copy, check the poster and gatefold. I’d forgotten how big the poster was!
How many Millennium Falcons? Early John Berkey concept painting when the Falcon was a rebel fighter – there’s a fascinating glimpse at more Star Wars Berkey prelim paintings on his site
This afternoon I sat in on Jonny Trunk’s OST show on Resonance 104.4 FM with a show brought to you by the letter ‘S’ – that means Sesame Street / Star Wars / Lalo Schifrin and special guest Jonny Cuba from Soundsci. Library cues, exclusives, soundtracks, skits, samples and more including mic fluffs and badly scratched records.
Two dates for your diaries: June 25th I’ll be DJing with Jonny Trunk at Camberwell’s finest used record emporium, Rat Records. They recently bought in a really good selection of soundtrack, electronic, library and weird records which we’ll be playing selections from before adding them to the racks for punters to buy. Let US try, before YOU buy.
But before that – this Saturday to be precise – I’ll be sitting in for Jonny on his OST radio show on Resonance 104.4 FM from 4.30-6.40pm. There’ll be a theme to the show and I’ll have special guest Jonny Cuba from Soundsci talking about library digs and soundtrack finds. Listen here this weekend
I’ll be joining my old friend and label mate James Braddell aka Funki Porcini on July 7th for a night of film and music at the BFI in London. As well aa launching his new album, Conservative Apocalypse, he’ll be showing his re-score to Kote Mikaberidze’s silent film Chemi Bebia (65min). Full of clever camera trickery, this Georgian film appeared for only a few days in January of 1929 before being banned for 39 years, and is little known in the West.
James will be talking through some of the new film work he’s been making these past years, some of which will be shown for the first time in the UK. If you’ve ever heard him speak before you’ll know he’s a joy to listen to as he has some of the best anecdotes you’ll ever hear. I’ll be playing in the Benugo bar on the Southbank after the film showing and there will also be some very limited edition versions of the album on sale. Tickets are on sale now here
Several artists have produced posters for the Remain campaign, Wolfgang Tillmans, Eva Rothschild, Trevor Jackson are shown here and all can be viewed and downloaded on the Artists For IN site.
The Olivetti exhibition currently at the ICA in London is small but perfectly formed, much like its contents. Blink and you’ll miss it (tucked away in a little room under the stairs to the bar), it’s a beautiful collection of vintage typewriters and word processors supported by original posters, promo material and historical documents.
Inspired by this tiny treasure trove of gorgeous design I raided my archives of Graphis Annuals and Architecture Aujourd’hui magazines and snapped a few quick shots of Olivetti adverts contained within.
This weekend I visited the Yorkshire Sculpture Park for the final week of the KAWS and Eduardo Paolozzi exhibitions (not shown but awesome). Highly recommended but only one week left! I’ll let the pictures do the talking, they’re mainly KAWS but there are some other incidentals from the park added in too.
Things have been a bit quiet on here recently due to various changes happening in my life right now, 2016 is turning out to be quite a rollercoaster. I’ve been a little more active over on Instagram though, with almost daily postings of personal miscellania, record finds and the Kosmischer Debris series, but even that’s taken a hit this month.
Above – top row, some experiments that date back a fair few years now with manipulated audio waves put through a spectral visualiser. Middle row – left: collage detail, middle: ‘Circult Skull 1′ test, right: ‘weird jazz thing’ that was the unexpected result of an old Freehand file where I held down the wrong key. Bottom row – experiments with a flexible material and light reflections – more to come with that…
The front and back covers of two amazing religious spoken word records – love the double entendre.
Below: Four Music De Wolfe 10″ library records, the ‘Electroshake’ is particularly good, there’s a vol.2 as well…
45 finds – the Public Enemy includes the instrumental on the flip
A fun little flexi disc from Fermaley Flame – nice electronics at the beginning and end
Lastly – a beautiful Robert Crumb sleeve from 1974
Sculpture, Splice festival
“Untitled” by Sculpture from The Wire Magazine on Vimeo.
More ideas in 8 minutes than some people have in an entire career…
Sculpture will be appearing at the first of 3 nights under the banner of Splice in London next weekend 3rd-5th of June along with many audio-visual acts like The Light Surgeons, DJ Cheeba, Addictive TV, Pete Elastic Eye, Cassetteboy, D-Fuse, Blinkinlab, Matt Black, Plaid, Joe Catchpole, Mixmaster Morris, Matt Sharp, Mark Pilkington and many more.
Splice Festival 2016 from Splice Festival on Vimeo.
I’ve always been fascinated by this cover art, the artist is simply listed as ‘Corrigan’. On the back of the Castor LP it has a passage about the cover, possibly written by Corrigan (?):
“The illustration depicts Jimmy Castor in a double role: as a Gemini and Cancer personality. Gemini’s aspects are described as egocentric, intellectual and airy. Castor’s egocentric aspect is affirmed by his unconcealed face; his intellect is symbolized by the tube running from a fitting on his temple to a fitting in the musical tree. His mind drives his music. A second tube runs on to a small cluster of clouds hovering near Castor’s head, symbolizing his airy and mutable nature. Castor’s Cancer aspects are symbolized on the right by the slum tenement which rises out of wasteland. Castor is directly above a large opening in a wall containing his heart; this serves to stress Cancer’s intuitive qualities. Castor’s face is partially concealed to correspond to the introverted nature of Cancer personalities. The tube which runs from his heart is attached to an armored egg; spilling out of the egg are three elements associated with Cancer: the moon, water and food. The prehistoric, “Troglodyte”-like figures are the end products of the intellectual, emotional and astrological input of Castor from above.”
After a bit of help from fellow facebook-ers, it seems the man responsible was Dennis Corrigan, a surrealist American illustrator who only has one other record sleeve listed on Discogs (The New York Rock & Rock Ensemble, front and back covers below).
Still with us and now teaching at Marywood University in Pennsylvania, he has work in various art institute collections and illustrated for the likes of The New York Times, Random House, Pan American Airways and more. He’s had several books of his work published, ‘The Amusement Park’ from 1982 and ‘True Love Knows No Boundaries’ from just last year. You can find more about his weird world at his website, Dennis Corrigan Artist.
Wishing I had the funds to get one of these bots, a 24″ TK Hunter by Ashley Wood, several years in production now but at $600’s it’s way out of reach. On sale on May 30th from 3A’s Bambaland store.
Out today, another banger from Soundsci – this time concentrating on Oxygen. ‘1-4-9′ is under two minutes and comes with an instrumental to match on the same side, surely a first for a 45? This is the second in a trilogy of 45s from the crew before they drop their LP, ‘Walk The Earth’ and features a great cover from Paul ‘Sub2’ Trewin who also did all the character designs for the 45 Live roster earlier this year. Buy it here before it goes
