Cygnus – Cosmos

Cygnus (real name, Phillip Washington) is an electronica artist who hails from Dallas, Texas. He has recently released the album ‘Cosmos’ which is available to purchase from Bandcamp, for $10. Click here to view/purchase.

The album opens with the track ‘Cosmos I’ and an unusual chord sequence which immediately conjured up images in my head, from Ridley Scott’s, fabled ‘Blade Runner’ movie. I also felt that, if played on a piano, it wouldn’t have been out of place in a free-form jazz arrangement, at least until the track develops, adding an arpeggio reminiscent of the type of melody lines used by Plaid (Warp Records).

A few seconds into the next track, entitled ‘Shuttle Launch’, it became obvious that the influence of science fiction was not only inspiring the artwork, but was firmly woven into the music as well. This one starts with much more of a retro sound, which is quickly accompanied by another interesting and slightly bizarre chord sequence, this time reminding me of Max Tundra (Domino Records).

‘Global Satellite Network’ is the name of the third track, which, when the beat kicks in sounds akin to some of AFX’s Analord series. I expect this is partly due to the use of an analog drum machine which may well be a Roland 909. The first, longer track on the album, this one definitely takes you on a journey, seamlessly altering trajectory between sections.

As well as a clear Sci-Fi element, there is also a strong retro feel to this album, not dissimilar to certain 16bit video games, especially some I used to play on the Sega Megadrive/Genesis. And although ‘Cosmos’ may wear its influences on its sleeve, this is in no way detrimental to the finished product, which appears to me to be the alien love-child of IDM and Electro. Whilst it is neither exclusively, a sense of both genres is apparent throughout. Listen out for the fantastic vocoder part in ‘Cosmos II’ and the beautiful synth work in ‘Cosmos III/Laniakea Supercluster’, which makes for my personal favourite on the album.

My only criticism is that the end is so abrupt, but it did leave me wanting more and certainly didn’t affect my overall enjoyment of this great selection of tracks.

Cygnus has also released music through Icasea Records, Central Processing Unit Records and Radical Symmetry Records. I also thoroughly recommend checking out his release ‘Tesseracter’ on CPU [CPU00001101D].

New York Is Killing Me (Chris Cunningham Remix)

Haunting last video of Gil Scott-Heron

Other Colours of Noise

Phonode

Phonode is a new website devised by the UE collective. It will focus on the more exploratory fringes of electronic music, demystifying the techniques used by musicians and artists working in the field, reviewing albums and equipment as well as examining the new processes and ideas which drive its creation. As the boundaries between noise and techno blur, disparate scenes seem to cross-pollinate more than ever before, and electronic music returns to a more experimental DIY aesthetic – the time seems ripe to launch a fresh investigation into where electronic music is at, and where it’s going next…

Visit Phonode

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Al Thawra (work still in progress)

Don’t stop fighting for freedom Egypt

The Problem With Science

New documentary film by Michael Coldwell on philosopher Jim Schofield’s latest theories. Science has made several crucial assumptions that are fundamentally flawed, and may have skewed our view of the world around us.
Music is supplied by our friends in the Urban Exploration collective 🙂

A Remix Manifesto

Vengeance Rhythm

Haikyo Volume One

New compilation album for free download from Dead-Channel.com – featuring the work of the Urban Exploration collective – Download here

Rap News 15

Putin Lights Up the Fires

New single from Pussy Riot

From The Guardian

Rap News 14

The Pussy Riot Trial

I never thought I’d say this, but massive respect to Madonna for her stunt supporting Pussy Riot. People like Yoko Ono and Sting have made statements in support of the band and stuff, but only Madonna went to Russia personally and performed in front of a crowd of thousands of people with their name scrawled across her fucking back! I know she’s a master of cynically using controversy for her own publicity and everything, but fair play to her for this one – I just hope it makes sufficient impact. The fact that sentencing has been delayed may indicate that they are wavering under growing public support for Pussy Riot’s plight.

Madonna’s performance certainly seems to have offended the right people, with a Russian deputy Prime Minister (and former ambassador to NATO) tweeting “With age, every former slut tries to lecture everyone on morality” and a priest from the Russian Orthodox church urging believers to call in bomb threats to disrupt the gig! It sounds like they are clutching at straws to me. You can read more on this in The Guardian.

Pussy Riot’s closing statements yesterday took the form of a rousing speech against the authoritarian regime in Russia, leaving no doubt in my mind that these women are true freedom fighters and intelligent artists who have been demonized as part of a wider crackdown on dissent in the country.

The closing statements from Nadezhda Tolokonnikova in trial. 8 august 2012:

“Yesterday (on the 7th of August according to the website lenta.ru) Madonna’s performance took place. Madonna performed with the inscription “Pussy Riot” on her back. More and more people see that we are kept in pre-trial prison illegally and because of an absolutely false accusation. I am astounded by it. I am astounded by the fact that truth really triumphs over lies though we are physically here, in the cage. We are freer than all the people sitting opposite us on the side of the prosecution because we can say everything we want and we do it. As for the people from the side of the prosecution, they say only words passed by a political censor. They can’t say such words as “punk-prayer” and “Virgin Mary, redeem us of Putin!” They can’t say the lines from our punk-prayer that are related to the political system. They probably think that another reason why we are to be put into prison is our rebellion against Putin and his system. But they can’t say it because they are prohibited to do it. Their mouths are sewn. Unfortunately, they are just puppets at this trial. I hope they will realize it and will also head for freedom, truth and sincerity because all this is more important than static nature, affected decency and hypocrisy.

Because we don’t really have religious hatred, and never had it, our accusers have no choice but to resort to using a false witnesses. One of them – Motilda Ivashchenko -got ashamed and did not appear in court. And there is no more evidence of our hatred and enmity, in addition to this so-called expertise. Therefore, the court, if it would be honest and fair, must admit inadmissible evidence, due to the fact that this is not a rigorous scientific and objective text, rather dirty and mendacious piece of paper times of medieval inquisition.

Prosecution is ashamed to voice excerpts from lyrics by PussyRiot, because they are in fact the evidence of the lack of motive. I’ll present you this excerpt here, I think it’s very valuable. It’s from the interview for the “Russian Reporter” magazine, that was given on the next day after the performance in the Chuch of Jesus The Savior: “We feel great respect to any religion and to orthodoxy in particular, that’s why we’re so distressed about that, so great and so positive as it is, Christian Philosophy is being used in such a filthy way. Our brain is getting blown out by that all this beauty is being now used from the back. All of this is quite painful to observe.

14:47 In the end I’d like to quote one of the Pussy Riot’s songs, as if curiously enough all of them turned to be fateful. Including the one which says: “Head of the KGB, their major saint, guides the protesters to detention under escort”.

15:06 And what I’m going to quote right now is this very line: “Open all doors, take off your shoulder straps, feel the air of freedom with us”.”

Good luck Pussy Riot, you have our love and respect.

Free Pussy Riot Now!

Digital Amnesty

Urban Exploration in the Ragged Kingdom

ISAM live in Graz

Ragged Kingdom Closing Party

Artist and anarchist Jamie Reid, perhaps best known for his work with the Sex Pistols, is currently exhibiting a retrospective of his work at Temple Works in Leeds. The exhibition is on until the July 14th closing with an evening of experimental music and art curated by the Urban Exploration collective.

Interview with Jamie Reid
Urban Exploration Page

Urban Exploration will present a 4 hour epic set involving collaborative improv with Oliver Knight (spoken word), Jenny Komowsky (classical singing), Rowan Reid (singer/songwriter), Umcorps (modular synthesist), and a Navajo indian spirit dancer….all with a backdrop of tipis, interactive visuals and the largest reverb room ever!

More info on this event from Temple Works

Who’s George? Find out on the final night of Jamie Reid’s Ragged Kingdom at Temple.Works.Leeds, July 14, 7:00 pm – 1:00 am.

A fundraiser for St George’s Crypt homeless shelter in memory of our much loved porter Brian Bird (1959 – 2012), the night will see Jamie himself back at Temple.Works.Leeds.  An evening of extraordinary experiences will include experimental electronic ambient collective Urban Exploration collaborating with an opera singer, a poet, a singer songwriter (Jamie’s daughter Rowan), a hip-hop mc and a modular synthesist, and an acoustic set by Brian’s friends the Urban Stage Band – moving  from the Joiners bar into the Open Loading bay for a night of sound, light and …dancing by our surprise guest, Dennis Lee Rogers, the Spirit Dancer of the Navajo Nation in proximity to Jamie’s immense tipis which form part of his ongoing work around the Eightfold year. Celebrated dancer, artist and educator, Dennis met Jamie Reid in 1998 while on tour in U.K and returned to open Ragged Kingdom.in London in October 2011  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q2Impc6pM8. Jamie’s piece Corporate Slavery currently hung in the Joiner’s Bar Main Gallery Space features Dennis himself.

Facebook Event Page

Marsen Jules & Anders Weberg

OK (8bit) Computer!

Rap News 13

Life in the Overgrowth

Music by Urban Exploration

Arrangement and Video by Conflux

Hip Hop of the Arab Spring

Tunisian soundtrack to the revolution ^^

BBC article on Is hip hop driving the Arab Spring?

Music of the Egyptian revolution, including my own attempt Al Thawra.

It Never Rains But It Pours

It looks increasingly like Soundcloud is on dodgy ground to my mind. I cancelled my own premium subscription to their service after there was an unacceptable level of downtime. If I’m paying for something I expect it to be reliable, if it ceases to be so, I reserve my right to refuse to pay.

Now it looks like the website is cracking down on the supposed copyright infringement inherent in it’s DJ and Remix content. Sampling musicians, DJs uploading mixes and remixes made the website what it is today, so what gives? Has the website now got too big for it’s boots? Are DJs and producers going to have to go elsewhere to ply their wares?

Maybe we should all cancel our premium accounts, see how they like that?

Have a read of this article in Chicago Reader for a deeper insight into what Soundcloud are up to…

More views on this news (and the above image) can be found on digitaldjtips.com

Björk’s Moon

More reasons to love the Icelandic 😉

Urban Exploration jamming at Temple Works

Laurel Halo – Embassy

Urban Exploration – Subterranean

Urban Exploration’s debut release is out now on If The Kids records in Berlin. The EP is available from various online record shops including iTunes, Juno, Amazon and Beatport.

You can get the release here.

If you are taking part in the Black March protest, don’t worry, we will be posting this again in April, just wait till then 😉

Here are some previews of the release:

Clark – The Pining

New summery psychedelic sound from Warp’s biggest chameleon, Clark.

This is the second track preview from Clark’s new album ‘Iradelphic’ to be released 2nd/3rd April 2012. More info http://warp.net/clark & http://facebook.com/throttleclark

Preorder – http://bleep.com/index.php?page=release_details&releaseid=34461

Review coming soon…

Operation Black March

Generation OS13

For a new era, generation OS13, the repression will not be tolerated; do the government really think they can win that war if the young people are like fuck this, you cant beat that you, can’t beat us, it’s Impossible – Saul Williams

Slightly flawed but welcome documentary from someone ‘Anonymous’
Give it a watch, keep your eyes open <o>

Black March is coming…

I’m a musician and DJ, I help to run a record label and have been involved in running live music events, promoting independent music and writing about it online for many years – I love music and the people that make it, but I don’t have much love for the music ‘industry’. Like most big business entertainment, the music biz leeches off the hard working and the talented, makes huge profits and routinely fucks over both the artist and the consumer.

Have a look at this link if you are still in any doubt about who this parasitic behemoth really benefits. It aint the musician.

These are the people that are lobbying governments worldwide to monitor online content, censor and remove websites they don’t like, and they support the introduction of draconian litigation such as the now infamous SOPA, PIPA and PCIPA bills, to defend their industry.

While I completely support the musician’s right to earn a living from their craft, clamping down on internet freedom is not the way to defend it. A free internet is vital for a free world. If governments and corporations have increased powers over internet content that freedom is threatened. The web is the most powerful tool we have for self-expression, inducing social change and for the dissemination of great art and music. We cannot allow these people to take that away from us.

This is why I support the Black March campaign.

From the 1st of March 2012 to the 31st, we ask you not to buy any music, DVDs, computer games or books – don’t even torrent a song! Wait till the 1st of April and buy it then. No one will actually lose any money, but the visible dent in their profit margins for the first quarter will send a powerful message to the corporations and organisations that wish to push these online censorship measures. We can stop this going through. Wikipedia and others going dark last month, and the attacks by Anonymous have already made policy makers hesitate. If music consumers join the fray, they will have another powerful enemy. Vote with your wallet and support Black March – boycott the music industry next month.

Some of my friends have expressed concerns that this campaign will somehow hurt small labels and record stores, who of course have nothing to do with lobbying for increased control of internet content. My answer to this dilemma is very straightforward. Buy the music you would have bought in March now. And spend more again in April. Of course you should support the small businesses and record labels you respect. This isn’t about them. This about sending a message to the industry as a whole, the big distributors, the fat cats and to governments around the world. We will not tolerate internet censorship in any form.

If you care about online freedom, please get involved in this campaign. If you wish to see a fairer music industry, buy music directly from the artists and from small record shops. Fuck Universal. Fuck Disney. Fuck News Corporation. Fuck Sony Music Entertainment. Support freedom and creativity.

Sorry for the rant peeps! If you’ve read this far I salute you. Peace out.

Bumper Xmas Stocking from Dead Channel

Hope your Crimbo festivities are going well and such!

Here’s a phat Christmas hamper for all eclectronic music lovers out there, from our very good friends at DC.

All free and festive, and the usual high quality we have come to expect from this growing net label. Get downloading people!

Click on the Album covers to download, or go to www.dead-channel.com for even more free music. Happy New Year 😉