| Immersion
BERNARD Parmegiani / PHILIP Samartzis
syn 003: split 12"
"The pairing of the influential French electronic musician, Bernard Parmegiani, and Australian sound artist Philip Samartzis on the Immer/Sound - Transparency split is a match that makes perfect sense. Parmegiani's body of work is massive and has been a driving force behind the evolution of electro-acoustic music. His contribution to the split, 'Immer/Sound,' is a continuation of his exploration into composed acoustic sounds, which begins with a reverberated snare hit and evolves into a head spinning journey that one could only imagine listening to on a full sound system. On the split-side, Philip crafts a carefully plotted and composed piece, 'Transparency,' which sends the listener in and out of a hazy world of electronic hisses, hums, and intonations. This split celebrates Bernard's performance and involvement in Philip's produced Immersion festival, which is coming up on its third event in September. Although generations apart, both artists have laid common ground in their music, which is evident in this exciting new split LP between these two heavyweight electronic musicians." split release with plates of sound.
Idle Bones 
FRANCIS PLAGNE
syn 018 : cd 16 tracks from young buck, keen bean, Melbourne lad Francis Plagne. Bedroom explorations of a melodic and destructive nature. Multi-tracked popped chops sing songs you need to hear! Trust us.
This journey will take you two folds in, quite possibly three or four. Again, trust us! there is no sacrifice for you here, fair listener. What lies here within is one man barber shop pop music, klangtankerous improv, concrete joy and heavenly hell. All you need to do is press play. Press play, sit back and enjoy the day. A boy once spoke of fish in a manner that shook the very foundations of fish culture. "Idle Bones", the cd (and limited lp), is a creature of such a nature that it bears no relation to said disturbance of said fish.
Please embrace and wrap your friends around the melodic-pop-concrete-machine-improv tunes + non-tunes within. Backscatter
Robin Fox
syn 012: dvd
Backscatter is the debut solo release from Australian electronic artist Robin Fox. The DVD contains ten audio-visual suites that meld sound and vision at the point of signal pathway and current. The works were composed for the cathode ray oscilloscope in such a way that the electricity used to generate sound is also used to excite a single light photon across a phosphorous screen. The results of this one to one audio-visual relationship are often surprising yet make sense on some deeply synaesthetic level. The10 suites vary dramatically from the beautiful and subtle Nyquist Variations to the hard edged conceptualism of Green Multiple Rondo, from the generative phase relationships in Phase One and Phase Two to the ecstatic Mandala improvisations.
Mixed in Dolby 5.1 but also containing a full spectrum stereo mix.
This release re-connects synapses that have been dis-connected for too long! Touch Parking
Philip Samartzis & Rasmus Lunding
syn 008: 12"
Composed specifically for vinyl, Touch Parking is the second collaboration between Danish composer Rasmus B Lunding and Australian artist Philip Samartzis, and is comprised of an eclectic series of reconfigured studio improvisations recorded in Denmark in 2003. Touch Parking exemplifies Lunding and Samartzis' comprehensive knowledge of the avant-garde, and expertise in abstraction, montage and spatialisation, in which new fields of acoustic experience are rendered from incongruous streams of data, contoured into a loving celebration of polytonal, atonal, and rhythmic as well as arrhythmic and dissonant music.
The recordings have been carefully prepared for vinyl through a unique mastering process conducted by post-digital folkist Goodiepal who has also conceived and designed the unique vinyl-artwork. Therefore Touch Parking is in fact two releases in one, the second release of Lunding/Samartzis, and at the same time one in a series of Vinyl-art releases previously known as Goodiebags by the eccentric and mysterious Goodiepal. Coagulate
Anthony Pateras & Robin Fox
syn 007: cd
Utilising a diverse array of approaches and forms, this album presents incredible real-time mutations of acoustic and electronic resources fused by a chaotic and physical improvisational language. From discarded piano frames to feedback to ingested microphones to vintage synthesizers, resources are combined, deconstructed, developed and devastated through both linear and non-linear trajectories. Oscillating between the extreme vocalise of 'voxerratum', the delicate feedback mass of 'Recombinant', and the pianistic submersion of '44º Splinter', 'Coagulate' offers an essential document of contemporary improvisational practice exemplifying ear-bending relationships between the acoustic and electronic.
2 track 
Hecker
syn 004 / mego 064: 12''
A fine example of just how far extreme audio has come - electroacoustic whiplash courtesy of hypertense audio angles and intense digital disorientation. "Pandämonium 9 Playlist" rides a manic curve with jagged edges, abrupt swoops, metallic bites and wild bass bombs - an all out war on the senses which leaves the listener simutanously baffled + energised. "Stocha Acid Vlook" hijacks the senses in a torrential digital storm. A macabre buzzing drills it's way through sweeping hiss and wailing sheets of sound propel the listener through a violent and furious lysergic 4 mins 30 secs.
Live @ Synaesthesia
Fennesz + Rosy Parlane
syn001: '' 3 cd
Recorded live @ synaesthesia 1.2.00 * Please note this title has sold and not available for order.
| Gauticle
PATERAS/BAXTER/BROWN
syn 019: cd
Following their critically acclaimed debut Ataxia, Melbourne based trio Pateras/Baxter/Brown continue their meta-instrumental explorations into intuitive music on their follow up Gauticle. Using the unique combination of prepared piano, percussion and prepared guitar, the trio fuse liquid structure and instinct to create 5 beautiful works that defy stylistic comparison. Recorded during their 2004 European tour in both London and Vienna, Gauticle presents the trio at their finest, capturing both the intensity of their live performances and the delicacy of their more subtle studio work.
Founded within a plethora of passions including electronic noise, the classical avant garde and free jazz, Pateras/Baxter/Brown hold a strong argument against the early 21st century plinky plonk profileration. Multi-temporarl textures collide with shredding electro-acoustic resonance (although completely acoustic). Parallels intersect and splice to create overwhelming textural spasms. Most importantly the instrumental techniques used are considered, fascinating and at times, ridiculous.
0_Synaesthesia Edition
MARCO FUSINATO
syn 013-016 : 4LP SET
limited to 100 copies
Ok, let's face facts. What we are presenting here is four records, four records at once. Sold only as a set. No seperation here folks. You are either with us or not - simple. Within these four slabs of vinyl expect no recorded material whatsoever as this is what you will get - nothing!. Yes, you heard right... There is no music, no non-music, no sound art, no lo-fi explorations, no improvisation, no composition, no sub bass doom, no rock, no reductionism, no freewheelin forest action, no electronic extravaganza, no deconstructed pop, punk or disco, no nothing: ie: this record offers nadda or rather - zip! it's empty - this is what we offer, four lp's (at once) with no recorded material whatsoever.... As a 4LP monster package of N.O.T.H.I.N.G !
Or do we?
Intrigued? .... Then come with us:
The 0_ in the trilogy refers to an absence of music. Ironically this process has produced damaged vinyl of the highest (lowest) order. The space, density and shape of the grooves determine the random composition of the audio, resulting in unfettered grit /noise / texture / chaos. This process provides a curious link between aesthetics in opposition, of silence and noise, the visual and the sonic. These works disrupt notions of linear playing time as found in conventional sound recordings and as a result, the possibility of endless variation arises from the erratic wanderings of the stylus running across the vinyl surface.
The traditional process is reversed. ie: music is not dictated by what information is stored within the grooves, rather, the 'empty' grooves themselves create the "music". The end result is a simple and crude observation on the means of expression via sonic reproduction, which encourages the owner to partake in the overall shape of the audio along with observing the uncontrollable input of the needle itself.
Marco Fusinato is a well known visual artist who has exhibited extensively within local and international art contexts. His projects have often incorporated elements from the music world along with that of the visual arts.
This release presents the third part of Fusinato's 12 inch trilogy. The first two parts were made specifically for gallery contexts in microeditions. This 4 LP mega-set is the commercial release of the project. Again Fusinato applies his unique method of making drawings of messed-up grooves that are then referenced and transferred to the master acetates for the final pressing.
file under: blank, naught, nil, nobody, nonentity, nothing, nothingness, nought, nullity, squat, zilch, zippo, zot. Ataxia
PATERAS / BAXTER / BROWN
syn 009: cd
Prepared piano, percussion and prepared guitar combine to formulate an impulse-based meta-instrument on this startling debut from Melbourne trio Pateras/Baxter/Brown. Consisting of composer/pianist Anthony Pateras, percussionist Sean Baxter and electroacustic composer/guitarist David Brown, Ataxia (meaning the loss of muscluar co-ordination) explores a distinctive sound world where timbres rebound and melt within an elastic performative framework.
Dynamically oscillating between delicacy & brutality, Ataxia contains everthing from textural assault to contemplative explorations of space. On "Bulbous", the trio create a constant, jerky stream of barely recognisable sounds. In "St/Chi", silence is sliced by explosive microsonic gestures, eventually creating an acoustic mutant licking at the speaker cones. On the closing track "Hexadactlyly", the listeners face is slammed against the piano strings, thrown into percussive chaos before sinking back into an ambiguous oubliette of spacial dialogue.
With the overall language falling somewhere between the structural integrity of Feldman and Xenakis, the texutral gymnastics of Hecker and Merzbow, and the dynamic fluidity of AMM and Polweschel, Ataxia will appeal to dot-heads, patch-monkeys and improv junkies alike. It Would Have Lived Here
Snawklor
syn 006: cd
Snawklor is a project that reorders the sonic environments of D. Krasevac and N. Gray. They create compositions exploring ideas of space and personal location by processing and re-ordering recordings of their sonic environments. Their compositions not only use the sounds around them but also mimic their perceived structures, layering them via a mixture of order and automated indeterminacy. ' It would have lived here' is their second full length release. A rich display of acoustic ecology incorporating field recordings, miked up metallic percussion, tape debris and computer construction. Whilst remixing the world around them Snawklor have developed a unique aesthetic language which is far from Windham Hill utopia but neither is the the evil edge in nature as encountered in some of the recordings of Francisco Lopez and the like.
Strewth!
Various
syn 002: cd
"A compilation of abstract electronic music from Australia and New Zealand"
Where this compilation succeeds is in it's ability to encompass the wide variety and all round high quality of the Pacific Rim's damaged and exploratory audio activities. However, in a single volume this compilation lays forth an initial reading of such activities, a chart to navigate the various creative threads unfolding throughout the region if you will.
Stylistically the 60+ mins represented here runs the gamut from the hendrix meets ina-grm collision of Candlesnuffer, "head in a television" static of Philip Samartzis, narrative driven kung-fu electroacoustics from Delire, skittering schizophrenia of Auigiugui, unusual vocal excursions of cray, gentle abstract beauty courtesy of Matthew Thomas, some subtle yet unnerving sonics of Darrin Verghagen and Netochka Nezvanova and some truly stunning alien frequencies unearthed via Dion Workman's mini disc feedback set up. Along with numerous other inventive approaches Strewth takes a cut-section of this disparate scene, presenting a broad range of challenging music packaged in standard jewel case with 12 page informative full colour booklet.
Complete artists represented:
Candlesnuffer
Delire
Philip Samartzis
zyzx
Xonk
Cray
Matthew Thomas
Netochka Nezvanova
Darrin Verhagen
Dave Franzke
Rosy Parlane
Oren Ambarchi
Auigiugui
Squinch
Dion Workman
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