Four new releases to mark the passage of endlessly-decomposing linear time under the spectacle-commodity form. All four releases in this batch are drawn together in their very perceptive ability to capture and render the themes of architecture, detritus, decomposition, madness, imaginings of (no-)futures, a sense of crumbling self and society under the auspecies of spectacle and its conception of historicism. Read the relevant sections of Guy Debord’s “Society Of The Spectacle” for greater insight and elaboration than I am capable of in this moment.
SC.011 – Pure Rave – Gallons c-32
Detroit experimental turntablist collective PURE RAVE has presented the label with an audio document of their exploration of the wreckage of the consumer and commodity. Through not only the records they select for sampling, altering, loop-cutting and manipulating – but also through the reappropriation and modification of consumer electronic goods (the turntable, the mixer, the drum machine, the CDJ, etc) – the collective (here, helmed by newest addition Will Lawson) is able to deterritorialize sound from its intended context and use (whether for entertainment / home listening, industrial trade use, political propagandizing, or the function that dance music records serve as a fundamental tool in the kit of the turntable operator) and then reterritorialize it upon a plane that presents its thesis – the creative destruction of sound-commodity-as-detritus, the fragility of the consumer supply chain, the decomposition of history within the commodity-spectacle, and the function of an art that reappropriates this deconstruction as a unique object of purpose. This release was mastered by K. Bednar, layout and design by Seith Communiti, digital print on heavy card stock by Outlandish Press. Limited to 50 physical copies.
SC.012 – Solanaceae Tau – Architektura Psychedelia c-60
Originally released on Prion Tapes in 1988, this cassette by prolific Frankfurt-based industrial act SOLANACEAE TAU captures the group at a point in refining their signature sparse, troubling sound architecture that melds anarchist-communist anti-art, critique of German mass-cultural psychology and the suffocation of nightmarish cybernetic dystopias. Here presented faithfully using scans of the original artwork and audio masters (with slightly updated layout and design), one is able to witness Solanaceae Tau’s melding of piston-driven rhythmic noise, angular punk scrapings and somber trance-state spoken word into a syncretic anti-music that draws daggers with the liberal fantasies of West German society and it’s sterile ambitions. Special thanks to Andreas Kirchner, Abdallah Siblani and Shane English. Original art by Solanaceae Tau. Layout by Seith Communiti, digital print on heavy card stock by Outlandish Press. Limited to 50 physical copies.
SC.013 – Andrew Nolan – Black Creek c-38
Following a series of solo releases for Canadian imprint Absurd Exposition, Toronto-based producer ANDREW NOLAN has constructed eight dizzying compositions that fuse elements of super-heavy dub, industrial hip hop and anxiety-ridden synth music into a brutal cosmopolitan synthesis. Black Creek is an attempt at assembling elements of the sonic psychogeography of 1980s Leeds, UK, and then reducing it down to what remains – “Radiophonic Workshop reimagined as a soundsystem,” in the artists’ own words. The tracks are tinged with a kind of subliminal horror and nauseous miasma, bleeding unwell energies from one track to the next, weaving coldly through uneasy dreamlike ambiance and intense peaks toward a somber epilogue. Layout and design by Seith Communiti, digital print on heavy card stock by Outlandish Press. Limited to 50 physical copies.
SC.014 – Kem C. – Shroud zine
Seattle-based graphic artist KEM C. presents a beautifully-rendered collection of xerox collage and text that builds a gestural narrative around the themes of historicism and decomposition. This 12-page zine presents works that combine scenes of crumbling architecture, cartoon-sprites, civilizational detritus and the use of xerox and digital collage to explore the meta-narrative themes of decay embodied by the medium itself. This physical-edition-only zine is printed on heavy white stock with a card stock jacket by Outlandish Press. Limited to 50 copies.
All releases are available to stream and in physical format via the Seith Communiti bandcamp page.