Plutonic Rainbows

Lovely early 90s ambient electronics from this often forgotten group consisting of Max Loderbauer and Tom Thiel. 30.7.94 Live harkens back to those days with dreamy, billowing synth washes, echoing samples and uplifting melodies.

Exceptional release from this duo is due on February 16th. There is a video of the live performance available here.

Fact Magazine:

Out February 16, the LP is a recording of a live improvisation by Sakamoto and Noto at the architect Philip Johnson’s Glass House in Connecticut. Rehearsing only one day before the performance, the duo experimented with a keyboard, mixers, singing glass bowls, crotales and the architecture of the building.

The recording was informed by an exhibition at The Glass House of work from 87-year-old Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama, which comprised the installation ‘Dots Obsession – Alive, Seeking For Eternal Hope.’

“When I was offered to perform at The Glass House, the first idea that came to my mind was to use the house itself as a musical instrument,” says Sakamoto of the recording, adding that it was “100 percent improvised.”

Sakamoto continues: “Looking at the beautiful landscape through the glass wall with Kusama’s dots was something, and it affected me, affected us, I should say, a lot. It’s a strange mixture of natural, nature, and artificial things, art.”

You can pre-order the album here.

Huerco S. releases a new album tomorrow under the alias, Pendant. It's also the first album on his new label. You can also have a look at Boomkat, who have audio to listen to.

NST on Bois Noir:

It seems most people believe objects from the past are better made, more lovingly created, and more beautiful than today’s ‘products’. At the museum where I volunteer, I always hear people pining for the past (“…if only the medical care were better!”) As I’ve gotten older, like Bois Noir, I’ve lost my sparkling top notes, my lemon-scented optimism. Not so long ago, I ignored ugly facts about people and places and eras I love; now, I face those hard facts head-on and look for deeper meaning, something to learn.

Though it does not compare with my shocking discovery that Colette (one of my idols) sometimes, as a young woman, beat her small dogs with a riding crop to train them, the fact that Bois Noir is not really ‘superior’ to Égoïste is ever so slightly startling…but freeing! Colette mellowed as she aged and learned that kindness and intense observation led to the best-trained dogs — and men — and I’ve learned that chasing after what is gone, fretting over the “expired,” crying over the extinct, are draining, time-consuming and futile pursuits.

We can all learn a few lessons from Bois Noir:

• If you like a limited edition fragrance or if you learn a beloved perfume is on the way out – buy as many bottles as you can afford.

• If you missed out on a fragrance, remember that everything and everyone will eventually disappear, and never having smelled Bois Noir (or Jean-Marie Farina Extrait de baume de Pérou or Lubin Enigma or Rigaud Un Air embaumé or Parfums de Rosine Aladin) is NOT a tragedy.

Something to keep in mind when you're thinking about your next vintage fragrance.