Touch Newsletter #154


Welcome to the Touch Newsletter #154. Lustmord’s Touch debut “Dark Matter” will be shipping this week.

London’s Union Chapel hosts the next Spire on 8th October. In performance: Charles Matthews, Fennesz, Philip Jeck, Simon Scott, Claire M Singer, John Beaumont and The Eternal Chord. Buy tickets at store.unionchapel.org.uk

Claire M Singer is also performing at The Barbican, supporting Stars of the Lid, on 2nd October. You can book tickets at www.barbican.org.uk

Presenting two new tapes from The Tapeworm. “Sabina” by Acid Fountain is a suite of improvised music about nature and magic from the Hylé Tapes founder. Marta De Pascalis’s “Anzar” features two works composed using improvisation on a tape-loop system. Both these remarkable recordings are now available in the TouchShop.

Originally planned for release on Ash International in 2010, “The Inauguration of the Elgaland-Vargaland Consulate for Portugal ~ Lisbon 2009” has only recently been recovered from a long-lost backup drive… Finally available in a cassette edition of 50 copies only.

Touch now has an Instagram account – follow us @toucharchive.




8th October 2016 | Spire at the Union Chapel, London

The 17th Spire will take place at Union Chapel, London on 8th October 2016 as part of the Organ Reframed Festival (7-9 October 2016).

Performers: Charles Matthews, Fennesz, Philip Jeck, Simon Scott, Claire M Singer, John Beaumont and The Eternal Chord.


Part One (7-845pm)
Charles Matthews from The Robertsbridge Codex (piano)
Simon Scott (organ and laptop)
Philip Jeck (turntables)
Charles Matthews plays Philip Glass: Music in Fifths (organ)

Interval – John Beaumont (voice)

Part Two (9-1030pm)
Fennesz (organ and laptop)
Charles Matthews – Stasis: Wastelands of Sleep from Andrew Glover-Whitley’s Symphony no.4 (organ)
Claire M Singer – The Molendinar (organ)
The Eternal Chord (organ) with John Beaumont (voice)
Charles Matthews plays Charles Camilleri (piano)


Spire, an experimental music programme for organ and electronic works, pushes the envelope for which this most traditional of instruments is used. The organ has the greatest frequency range of any acoustic instrument, but this is rarely exploited; the unique sound of the mechanical organ has often been limited and controlled and Spire aims to liberate it from its history without denying that history.

The programme is carefully curated by Charles Matthews, organist, and Mike Harding, creative producer; combining organ works ancient (The Robertsbridge Codex) and modern. Other performers use the organ and organ works as a basis for their own compositions, using piano, voice, record players, samplers and other electronic devices.


Buy tickets at unionchapel.org.uk
Facebook event page
www.spire.org.uk




TO:102 | Lustmord “Dark Matter”

CD + Digifile - 3 tracks - 70:38

Conceived and produced by B. Lustmord
Recorded in Los Angeles October-December 2015
Artwork and photography by Jon Wozencroft


Derived from an audio library of cosmological activity collected between 1993 and 2003. It was gathered from various sources including NASA (Cape Canaveral, Ames, The Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Arecibo), The Very Large Array, The National Radio Astronomy Observatory and various educational institutions and private contributors throughout the USA.

About Lustmord: Widely credited as the originator of the “Dark Ambient” genre. Credits on over forty motion pictures including The Crow and Underworld. One of the two composers for the Turtle Rock/2K game Evolve. Worked with John Balance, Chris & Cosey, Clock DVA, Current 93, Paul Haslinger, Maynard James Keenan, Melvins, Nurse With Wound, Tool and Wes Borland amongst others.


Order Lustmord “Dark Matter” [CD] in the TouchShop
www.lustmord.com




TTW#87 | Acid Fountain “Sabina”

Cassette only – limited edition of 150 copies
Illustration – Simon Scott

Track List
A1: Dreaming/Drumming
A2: San Pedro
A3: Goodbye Industry
A4: Heavy Sand
B1: Terres Rares
B2: Étoiles Filantes
B3: Mujer Espíritu


“Sabina” is a suite of improvised music about nature and magic. About the kind of traces we leave or want to leave on Earth. All music on this tape (except A4) was improvised and recorded in one take in Corbeil-Essonnes, France, during the last week of October 2015. Recorded, mixed and mastered by Richard Francés.

Francés is a French composer/musician born in Alicante in 1981 and now based in Paris. His project Acid Fountain seeks to bring together abstract and representational art, improvisation and composition, experimental and dance musics.

Other projects by Francés include Juju, his “électronique libre” duo with Adrien Kanter. He also composes, arranges and tours with French pop artists such as Owlle and Adrien Soleiman, to name but two… As a live performer, he has worked on Julien Lheuillier’s kosmische musik project Pointe du Lac and in 2015 has collaborated with the French art/dance collective (LA)HORDE. Previously, Richard played drums and synthesisers with French underground psych/kraut/drone band The New Reformed Church of Napalm Katia.

In January 2015 Richard founded the label Hylé Tapes: an experimental electronic music label releasing limited edition cassettes by international artists like Takahiro Mukai, Raphael Leray, D. Burke Mahoney, Jay Glass Dubs and Mortuus Auris & The Black Hand.


Buy Acid Fountain “Sabina” in the TouchShop
More information on www.tapeworm.org.uk




TTW#88 | Marta De Pascalis “Anzar”

Cassette only – limited edition of 100 copies
Illustration – GDP (Untitled,1973)

Track List
A: Anzar
B: Emerso


All music by Marta De Pascalis – synthesizers, tape echo. Mastered by Francesco Donadello at Calyx Mastering. De Pascalis (b. 1987) is a musician from Rome, currently based in Berlin, who works primarily with synthesisers and tape loops.

“Anzar” and “Emerso” are two works composed using improvisation on a tape-loop system, in which patterns of repetition create a sense of a dense, dynamic and cathartic distance. “Anzar”’s cover art is from a series of black ink paintings made by Marta’s father in the 1970s.

Marta De Pascalis writes: “I see these pieces as tied in a cyclical motion with their sounds moving in different directions. In “Anzar”, sounds are constantly “falling” from the source, landing gently and staying on the tape’s surface until they fade out to be replaced by other sounds, finally reaching an austere resolution. In “Emerso”, there’s a different scenario: a persistent theme in the background with sounds that slowly emerge, interact and then dissolve, ending with an abrupt change of tone. Where is the centre of this cycle? Where is the centre of this tape? The centre is moving constantly; the centre is missing. Switch sides. Repeat.” – Marta De Pascalis, Berlin, 19th August 2016.


Buy Marta De Pascalis “Anzar” in the TouchShop
More information on www.tapeworm.org.uk




Ash 9.3 | “The Inauguration of the Elgaland-Vargaland Consulate for Portugal ~ Lisbon 2009”

Cassette only – limited edition of 50 copies

Photography by José Frade.
Designed by the KREV Minister of Nothing.


The Inauguration of the Lisbon Consulate of the Kingdoms of Elgaland-Vargaland, 12th September 2009, in the presence of King Michael I, HM Ambassador UK and HM Ambassador Portugal. The inauguration took place at Maria Matos Theatre, Lisbon. The curator was Pedro Santos.

You will hear: the King and Ambassadors arriving; speeches; diplomatic discussions; inaugurations; marching bands; the public dinner; and more…

This cassette was planned for release in the summer of 2010, alongside BJNilsen’s “Draught #1” tape. Inlays were designed and printed, only for Ash International to forget where it had backed-up the audio sources.

Four years later, Heitor Alvelos found a copy of the recordings. Final edits were prepared and mastered in Porto by Anselmo Canha on 29th September 2014. 23 months later the tape was finally manufactured…


Buy “The Inauguration of the Elgaland-Vargaland Consulate for Portugal” in the TouchShop
www.elgaland-vargaland.org
www.ashinternational.com
www.teatromariamatos.pt




Guerrilla Audio

Guerrilla Audio is a new series of audio raids by Simon Fisher Turner.

guer·ril·la
ɡəˈrilə/
noun
noun: guerilla
a member of a small independent group taking part in irregular fighting, typically against larger regular forces.

Each audio edit will be posted for 14 days and then removed from the site, although the information about each guerrilla activity will be archived, but without the audio. There will be two postings per month with the first (also featuring Klara Lewis & Rainier Lericolais) on 1st August 2015, so please check in regularly to listen to the latest offering.


Guerrilla Audio
www.simonfisherturner.com




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