Rat-drifting launches 3 new titles
One of our favourite record labels, Rat-drifting (based in Toronto and France), recently re-launched on BandCamp after a few years of...
experimental
Alister Spence/Joe Williamson/Christopher Cantillo – “Opening”
Bells and bell-like sounds and cymbals, and other metal sounds, a searching piano and everything slowed down to a pace of...
Ecstatic noise w/ Marshall Trammell and Tashi Dorji
Joy with ferocity. Rattling drums and dirty electric guitar feels like punk opera unwound and bent. Recorded live in Portland, Duo...
Banjo Music for Carole Finer
Allison Cameron brought this release by Stephen Chase’s mon se taire truc editions to our attention. A tribute to Scratch Orchestra...
Bands of Rubber from Allison Cameron
Here’s a composed piece for the Rubber Band Quartet from Toronto improviser and composer Allison Cameron. It’s strange and particular music,...
Dictaphone delights w/ Joe Posset
Joe Posset of Newcastle does wonderful things with a mini-casette recorder. He’s turned it into a musical instrument to improvise with,...
Mary Halvorson’s Code Girl w/ Robert Wyatt
It’s nice to hear Robert Wyatt’s voice again, particularly with some heavy guitar licks. I missed this 2020 release when it...
Susana Santos Silva Impermanence’s “The Ocean Inside a Stone”
A five-member ensemble, led by trumpet player/composer Susana Santos Silva. Unexpected fusions, often signalled by Hugo Raro’s synthesizer work, take to...
“Crushingly horrible, hilarious, and stupid” w/ Raven Chacon and John Dieterich (Endlings)
A special session with Endlings (Ravon Chacon + John Dieterich [of Deerhoof]). Endlings have performed a work specially for Unusual Music...
Punkish w/ Martin Arnold and Jaye Kovach
In this episode Josh and Martin listen to Lemon Kittens, Shaggs, Junko, and the Kyoto Imperial Court Orchestra. After the break...
We love trippy: Listening with Renée Lear
This episode is with video artist Renée Lear, who has taken an unusual interest in unusual music. We listen to and...
Psychedelic & wonderful listening with Martin Arnold
Listen to the music of Martin Arnold, Rudolf Komorous, Archie Shepp, Jessie Mae Hemphill, and Nightjars. Martin is a brilliant thinker...
Uchihashi Kazuhisa and Ryoko Ono: “001”
Ryoko Ono on saxophone, and Uchihashi Kazuhisa on daxophone, an instrument developed in the 1980s. On this track, wildly assertive playing,...
Allison Cameron Band: “Guitars”
How guitars and banjo can be so themselves and so strange at the same time. Experimental composition with the energy of...
Golden Melody Awards
A strange correspondence of quasi-monody with timbral and spectral improbability. Banjo and analogue synth. Also notice how the resonant frequencies of...
Bass piano sounds like wind chimes of dreams
Andrew Wedman has invented a new instrument: the bass piano. It’s a regular piano but it’s tuned down. The detuning though,...
Guayaveras are sweet…and Rat-drifting relaunches on Bandcamp!
Serious as philosophy, loose as sleep, sweet as raspberries blown in a bubble bath. It’s Eric Chenaux on guitalele and toe-synth...
Strange sound colours: April Aliermo
Artemis of Colour by April Aliermo puts recordings of breath and the voice into dialogue with gorgeously rich oscillators. Some wild...
Karen Ng’s “Day 3 i”
It’s difficult to know what analogy works to describe Karen Ng’s stunning solo saxophone recordings: a thought process, a dialogue with...
Punk Kong’s “Pull Ninja”
Unusual soundscapish jazz takes noisy turns, distorted climbs, and opens to beautiful spaces. Pull Ninja by Punk Kong