Australia’s off-kilter breed of avant-psych weirdos, Tropical Fuck Storm, have just announced their second studio album Braindrops.
Braindrops is the follow up album to Tropical Fuck Storm's 2018 debut A Laughing Death In Meatspace. Based in the Australian outback—where they are free to make as much noise as they like—the album was written and recorded in their home 'Dodgy Brothers Studio' in regional Victoria.
“I've invented fake news as a genre of music,” Liddiard states on the new album. Braindrops overflows with compelling sounds and visions that reflect the often dark and fractured reality of life on planet Earth as we hurtle toward environmental and social decay at a frighteningly rapid clip.
A recurring theme on the album concerns the various ways the human brain can be manipulated and controlled for exploitative gain. Braindrops is a jarring and exhilarating experience, full of pulsating grooves, black humor, dissonant experimentation, and unsettling dystopian plotlines—a truly unrelenting work, from an unrelenting musical ensemble.
Released on August 23, the album is now available for pre-order on digital, CD, Hot Magenta Vinyl, and the limited VIP edition pictured below. Check out the first song, "Paradise".
Announcing the new album from WHY?, titled AOKOHIO.
From the classic Alopecia, to their 2017 favorite Moh Lhean, WHY? has spent nearly two decades traveling the remote sonic terrain where underground hip hop, avant-pop, and psych-rock meet. Today we are incredibly honored to bring you their new opus, AOKOHIO.
Possibly the most autobiographical album in the WHY? catalog, the 19-song AOKOHIO is undeniably new and forward-thinking, but it still contains all the personality that we've come to expect from WHY?... But calling AOKOHIO an "album" is actually a little misleading. Yoni Wolf actually recorded this piece of music as 6 distinct parts, each with their own purpose and identity. And to honor Yoni's original vision for the music, we have done something rather insane for the limited vinyl... instead of just making the VIP edition a different color of the 12" pressing, we did a special pressing of three separate 10" records, so that each of these 6 "chunks" (as Yoni calls them) can exist as its own distinct entity... each piece of music on its own side of a record.
AOKOHIO also has an amazing visual component, where the entire album is being made into a stunning video. The first movement is available right here, and released just today is the continuation, movement two.
The 3x10" box set VIP Edition is limited to 1000 hand-numbered copies, pressed on deluxe primary-colored vinyl, marbled with bone. This edition includes vinyl-only bonus tracks, extra artwork, and high quality MP3 + WAV download (instant download of 6 tracks, with the rest sent before 08/30).
Plus, 1 in every 5 copies are signed by Yoni.
Or stream / download from your preferred platform here: lnk.to/why-ii
Check out the stunning video for: II. I’ve been carving my elbows, I might just take flight.
Dig in further...
Yoni Wolf has spent the last two decades traveling the remote sonic terrain where underground hip hop, avant-pop, and psych-rock meet. Some of Yoni’s most compelling and critically-praised musical experiments have been issued under the moniker WHY? and his latest entry is no exception. On AOKOHIO Yoni condenses the essential elements of WHY? into a stunningly potent musical vision.
“Yoni Wolf has spent the last two decades traveling the remote sonic terrain where ”
Co-produced by Yoni and his brother Josiah, AOKOHIO presents a rich palette of musical voices that emerge and disappear into a constantly shifting kaleidoscope of sound. “I wanted a wide variety of sounds. I didn't want this album to sit in one sonic zone. I've always felt like too jagged of a person to be smooth in that way,” Yoni says. While the album features many notable guest contributors, from Lala Lala’s Lillie West, to Nick Sanborn and Amelia Meath of Sylvan Esso, the listener’s attention remains squarely directed on Yoni’s voice and vision.
AOKOHIO finds Yoni rethinking fundamental aspects of his approach to creating and delivering his music. The album is presented as six movements comprised of two to four songs each, with some segments appearing as brief fragments that dissolve within seconds.
“When I started this project, I decided I needed to try a new approach in creating music and how I work,” Yoni reflects. “I wasn't feeling the idea of going back in and making another ten or twelve song album. It felt arduous. It felt like too much. So I wanted to pare the process down and make it manageable. I thought, 'Why don't I make small five or six minute movements and finish up each movement before I move on to the next.' That's how I started approaching it. The whole process took over five years, I'd start working on something and set it aside for awhile. The earliest songs on this album started in 2013.“
As Yoni reimagined his approach to creating music, he also began thinking of new ways to share the music with his audience. “I initially wanted to release the music as I progressed through the project,” Yoni says. “When I finished a movement I wanted to put it up digitally on Bandcamp or Soundcloud. I just wanted to make little pieces of music and put them out there. But I had a call with my manager and the label and they said, 'We can release stuff through time like that, but we want to do it properly.' So the idea of the project changed after that, but it retained the integrity of working in movements. It's definitely a very different way of working for me. I think it has yielded some interesting results.”
The concept of sharing AOKOHIO in segments over time has been preserved with the release of an accompanying visual album. “I think it's a very artful way of putting the music out there,” Yoni explains. “It's like a television series, it's revealing itself slowly over time. I think it's cool that the audience gets to hear it one piece at a time, and has to wait and digest each piece before they get the next one.”
“I knew early on that I wanted that visual element for this album,” Yoni recalls. “My brother and I have worked on video stuff our whole lives. Our dad had video equipment since we were little kids, he had an editing suite in our basement. We weren't rich, we were actually fairly poor, but somehow he'd gotten ahold of these video editing decks and cameras. Even though my brother and I had dabbled in video as kids, it's not what we do for a living. So we wanted to find someone, and fucking randomly a guy messaged me on Instagram and was like, 'Hey, I like your music and I'd love to work with you.' I looked at his work and I was like, 'This guy is for real!' “
The author of that fateful Instagram message was Sundance award-winning director Miles Joris-Peyrafitte. “Miles directed the first three segments of the visual album and is the mastermind of the overarching video project,” Yoni explains. Joris-Peyrafitte’s visuals cut contemporary footage of Yoni and actress Tatiana Maslany with vintage home videos documenting Yoni’s childhood life in Cincinnati. It’s a fitting juxtaposition, as Yoni’s lyrics on AOKOHIO seem to question how memory, history, and place shape our anxieties and sense of self. “I moved back to Cincinnati after living in the Bay Area for over a decade,” Yoni says. “This album is very much me thinking about my mom and dad, and my siblings.”
Yoni’s return to his Ohio hometown brought on a period of critical self-reflection. “Is there a word for bad nostalgia?” Yoni asks. “When I think of the word nostalgia, it seems like pleasant feelings and all that, but this is not really like that. It's more about reflecting on the anxieties I've had since I was born. Why are they there? Is this epigenetics? Is that shit just inside of me because of the Holocaust and my relatives back then? What am I really? Why do I operate in these ways?”
Ultimately AOKOHIO sees Yoni pushing to find meaning and peace of mind in the moment, even if it’s not exactly where he wants to be. “The title is sarcastic I guess,” Yoni offers. “But it's also wishful. A lot of my album titles have been names of maladies, like Alopecia and Mumps, Etc. I don't want to project that into the world. You know, ‘A-OK Ohio, I'm here and it's fine.’ It's like a mantra, ‘A-OK Ohio, I'm here and it's OK.’ Even though in reality, everyday I'm like, 'I've got to get the hell out of Ohio.' “
AOKOHIO feels like a consequential addition to the WHY? catalog, possibly even an artistic turning point. But its creator remains circumspect when asked to comment on the album’s significance within his discography, instead preferring to characterize the work as the latest iteration of his deep commitment to his artistic practice. “I have no idea if this record is good or not,” Yoni says. “But I never really know. I know that I've never written a song that's indispensable to the American songbook. But in terms of what it is, it's a piece of art. I put blood, sweat, and tears into this album, and struggled through the creative process as I always do. As far as where this sits with the rest of my albums? I can't answer that. I just know that my career is a lifelong career, and I’m working it. Every time it feels right, it makes me feel good.”
WHY?
AOKOHIO
(Digital Release Date 08/09)
(Physical Release Date 08/30)
I. I may come out a broken yolk, I may come out on saddle.
1. Apogee
2. The Rash
3. Peel Free
II. I’ve been carving my elbows, I might just take flight.
4. Reason
5. Deleterio Motilis
6. Stained Glass Slipper
III. Please take me home, I don’t belong here.
7. The Launch
8. High Dive
9. Mr. Fifths’ Plea
10. Good Fire
IV. The surgeon nervously goes on, he never claimed to be God.
Narcissistic Lamentation
11. Krevin’
12. The Crippled Physician
13. Ustekinumab
V. I want to live with conviction, in silence and diction.
14. My Original
15. Rock Candy
16. Once Shy
VI. Though I’m tired, I’m still trying.
17. The Shame
18. Bloom Wither Bloom (for Mom)
Howdy White Label Subscribers,
Hope you are all doing well. I have some unfortunate news about this months White Label Series. It is currently behind in production and is being pressed for a third time due to manufacturing mess ups.
It's unfortunate, but long story short, delays in the plate making process pushed the production back. Once the run was going, after the plates were finally made, there was a blow out mid run, which made a huge scratch on Side B, so they need to be remade AGAIN. We couldn’t live with sending out less than ideal vinyl, and we are sorry for the delay.
All parties involved are working their hardest to get these sent out to y'all and the moment they get in our doors we'll get them out to you:)
My best,
Jonathan
June is here and with the departure of spring and the blazing hot entrance of summer comes the latest drop for our White Label Series. This month we have St. Vincent with her selection of Kotokoto, Institute.
Here is what St. Vincent has to say about her selection:
"Music has a different kind of logic than anything else.
When I listen to Toko Yasuda's work, I hear the logic of the ocean. Depth and flow and randomness that makes inexplicable emotional sense. I hear the sounds of the whole world traveled -- the exterior and interior landscapes and recesses explored fully but the mystery left fully intact.
Longing and release splash together. Waves of sines, waves of the sea. And always a sub level that you can feel but not see through the blue. But it moves you still."
- St. Vincent
Kotokoto
Institute
For our 2019 White Label Subscribers you can go to the WHITE LABEL DIGITAL DOWNLOAD page to download the digital.
We have a small amount of White Label Series subscriptions available at this time, but please follow Kotokoto on Bandcamp for a chance to purchase direct from her!
https://kotokoto.bandcamp.com/
The month of May is here and with the blooming of spring comes the latest drop for our White Label Series. This month we have Cate Le Bon with her selection of Bitw, Bitw.
Here is what she has to say about her selection:
"I fell for Gruff Ab Arwel’s idiosyncratic mind and music 10 years ago when, still at school, he was one half of surreal Welsh pop band, Eitha Tal Ffranco. They sung of part-time vegetarians and suicidal teachers. Cut from the same cloth as Welsh greats Euros Childs and Gruff Rhys but reared under a different moon. He went on to form 1/4 of the amazing Welsh Surf outfit, Y Niwl , and rediscovered a self-invented band from the 70’s in the eponymous film Bur Hoff Bai. This solo album under the moniker Bitw is an incredible continuation of the curiosity, mystery and casual surrealism that has imbued all of his work to date. It is sci-fi mountain music - songs that are equally familiar and uncanny. It is my absolute pleasure to shine a little light on this truly authentic artist and introduce you to the wonderful world of Bitw. "
- Cate Le Bon
Bitw
Bitw
For our 2019 White Label Subscribers you can go to the WHITE LABEL DIGITAL DOWNLOAD page to download the digital.
We are sold out of our subscription, but please follow Bitw on Bandcamp for a chance to purchase direct from the artist!
https://bitwbitwbitw.bandcamp.com/
The month of April is here and with the first of the month comes the latest drop for our White Label Series. This month we have Haley Fohr with her selection of Jeremy Freeze, Breaking the Skin.
Here is what she has to say about her selection:
"I met Jeremy Freeze in 2011 at a DIY festival in Chicago called “Bitchpork”. At the time we were both on the now defunct De Stijl records, known for its mainstay in heady reissues & archival material generally laced with LSD or some nondescript mind expanding component of the like. Hailing from Mississippi, Jeremy embodies a lifestyle and type of movement one would consider rare and hard to find in the hustling & bustling life of an inner city musician. Jeremy is cool & collected, complimented by an impressive work ethic but never showing sweat. He is sweet and polite, and reveals his encyclopedic knowledge of rock n’ roll in modest quantities through heartfelt conversation. I remember thinking that his music was great, and how nice it was to connect to someone so closely upon first meeting.
It wasn’t until Jan 1, 2017 that I was reconnected with Jeremy and his music. Moving from Memphis, Tennessee, Jeremy became my roommate for a year and a half. It was easy to bond with Jeremy. At the time we had both spent over a decade in the “weird-american underground” community and we had both sacrificed a big part of our lives for music. With his relocation came the unpacking of a fresh start, an enormous feat for any creature. Over the course of a year I witnessed Jeremy go through a vivid transformation. The way Jeremy took full agency over his life filled me with admiration. I admire Jeremy for his discipline, his mindfulness, and his ability to stay true to himself. I admire his ability to focus and execute creative ideas. He has a spirit that soars for the purity of life. The collection of songs in “Breaking The Skin” were written and recorded during his period of climbing that metaphorical mountain. The songs on this album recollect the mind of a person who has made great sacrifice, and has a deep understanding of life & music. I believe that Jeremy is the person in my life most deserving of this opportunity, and I am confident that the message other’s find in his music will breed good into the world. The music is also catchy as hell - long live R n R."
XX,
Haley
Jeremy Freeze
Breaking the Skin
For our 2019 White Label Subscribers you can go to the WHITE LABEL DIGITAL DOWNLOAD page to download the digital.
Our subscriptions are sold out, but you can support Jeremy Freeze's music by purchasing a copy from them direct on Bandcamp.
We are absolutely overjoyed to announce our Artist In Residence for 2019: Thor Harris.
Thor fully embodies the spirit of our Artist in Residence series. You may know Thor as the percussive polymath extraordinaire behind one of his many projects (Swans, Thor & Friends, Xiu Xiu, Bill Callahan, Amanda Palmer, Shearwater and many others including our own Dumb Numbers and Yonatan Gat's band).
But if you're unfamiliar with Thor Harris, there is a reason for that. Thor is rarely a leading man. He's an artistic facilitator - going where he is needed in service to the greater good... He's a musician's musician. And we thought it was time for the dude to get the top-billing-treatment he deserves.
Thor has lined up an impressive list of collaborators to join him on this year-long residency. We aren't revealing the full list of artists just yet, but the initial round of collaborators includes:
Alex Somers (producer, Sigur Rós)
Michael Gira & Norman Westberg (Swans)
Neko Case
Sharon Van Etten
Bill Callahan (Smog)
Ayse Hassan & Fay Milton (Savages)
Thierry Amar & Timothy Herzog (Godspeed You! Black Emperor)
Jeremy Barnes (Neutral Milk Hotel/A Hawk and a Hacksaw)
Heather Trost (A Hawk and a Hacksaw)
Andy Stack (Wye Oak)
Jamie Stewart (Xiu Xiu)
Margaret Chardiet (Pharmakon)
Lawrence English
Shahzad Ismaily
Sabrina Ellis (A Giant Dog/Sweet Spirit)
Greg Saunier & John Dietrich (Deerhoof)
Jasamine White-Gluz (No Joy)
Kid Millions (Oneida)
Yonatan Gat
Jad Fair (Half Japanese)
Sima Cunningham & Macie Stewart (Ohmme)
Marina Tadic (Eerie Wanda)
Adam Harding (Dumb Numbers)
C.J. Boyd
Daniel Smith (Danielson)
The vinyl box set will be limited to 666 copies on 6 colored vinyl records, packaged in a screen-printed wooden box set, which will be handmade by Thor himself. Yep, the dude is a woodworker. MP3 & WAV downloads of new music and bonus content will be sent every 6 weeks. Approximately 300 minutes of music in total...
We're really excited about this one... Hope y'all are too!
xo, JNR
Greetings friends,
If you're a fan of the label, chances are you're already very familiar with our guy Kishi Bashi. Beginning with his 2012 album 151a and the subsequent albums Lighght and Sonderlust, Kishi Bashi is our resident label virtuoso. And today we are elated to announce Kishi Bashi's new album: Omoiyari.
Omoiyari reflects the turbulent socio-political atmosphere of present day America, as viewed through the lens of Japanese-American internment camps in 1940s America. To find inspiration for the album, K visited former prison sites, listened to the stories of survivors, and explored the emotional lives of the innocent Japanese-Americans who were unjustly incarcerated in WWII America.
Stepping away from his past loop-based production model, this is a less overtly-complex version of Kishi Bashi. The focus of Omoiyari is centered squarely on its songs. And these songs are amazing (and are surprisingly uplifting considering the tragic subject matter).
Omoiyari will be released on May 31, 2019 - with a corresponding documentary film, Omoiyari: A Songfilm to be released in 2020.
This morning the first single has just premiered over at NPR.
Take a first listen to the song "Summer of '42" here.
About the cover art:
Cover photo: carved and painted scrap-wood bird pins by artists Himeo Fukuhara and Kazuko Matsumoto reprinted from - “The Art of Gaman: Arts and Crafts from the Japanese American Internment Camps 1942-1946,” (2004, Ten Speed Press) with the permission of author Delphine Hirasuna, designer Kit Hinrichs, and photographer Terry Heffernan.
The month of March is here and with the first of the month comes the latest drop for our White Label Series. This month we have Sondre Lerche with his selection of House of Hiss, Sand Never Sets.
Here is what he has to say about his selection:
"For many, many years the music of House Of Hiss was a well-kept secret among the musicians who recorded at Gjøa and Duper studios in Bergen, Norway at the turn of the century. It must’ve been around 1999 that I first got to hear some of these songs, by way of my guru and mentor at the time, the musical shaman, producer HP Gundersen. I was 16, recording what was to become my debut album, Faces Down, co-produced by HP and the wizard Jørgen Trœen at Duper Studio. Next-door, in Gjøa Studio, was the young producer Kato Ådland, my guitar player at the time, who since has served my music in many capacities, most recently as producer on my four latest albums. From these three peculiar characters I kept learning about a shy uncle from England who would occasionally come to visit our little town to record his bizarre and beautiful miniature songs and symphonies. Together these four made up the unlikely quartet that became House Of Hiss. Their first album No-Fi, from which many of the songs on this album originate, was never released. It was the most exquisite, luxurious little secret enjoyed by myself and a few lucky others over the years. It didn’t seem fair. When I heard the song Shang, sung by Sean O’Hagan from The High Llamas, my favorite band at the time, my world suddenly got a lot smaller, and my horizon a lot bigger.
Alisdair’s vast array of influences, and his low-key sensibility must’ve quietly expanded all of our horizons in various ways - certainly mine. In Kato, Jørgen and HP, Alisdair had connected with a trio of adventurous partners, up for the challenge of deconstructing and rebuilding his avant-garde easy listening ditties into House Of Hiss - with a little help from a cast of their favorite musical friends. It was perhaps Alisdair's intricate, yet affable songs, and the ambitious, playful recordings of House Of Hiss that best encapsulated the range of influences and sounds that informed much of the music that would result from this tiny musical scene for a few years into the new millennium. Which is why I’ve been hoping for an opportunity just like this to share the glorious music of House Of Hiss with the world beyond those studio walls."
Please enjoy,
Sondre Lerche
For our 2019 White Label Subscribers you can go to the WHITE LABEL DIGITAL DOWNLOAD page to download the digital.
Our subscriptions are sold out, but you can support House of Hiss' music by purchasing a copy from them direct on Bandcamp.
Today we are beyond excited to announce the new, limited edition 3xLP Box Set from Son Lux, titled Reissues & Remnants.
Son Lux and JNR go way back. We first began working with the band in 2013 with the release of their seminal album Lanterns. Even though we are no longer their exclusive label, Son Lux were pretty foundational for us at JNR, and we still love collaborating with Ryan Lott and co. whenever we get the chance. We couldn't be more excited to release this incredible 3xLP box set.
Reissues & Remnants features limited edition pressings of the first two full-length Son Lux records At War With Walls & Mazes (2008) and We Are Rising (2011)--both of which were originally released on the amazing Anticon label, and are long out of print. The set also includes the brand new LP Remnants, a compelling collection of rare and previously unreleased recordings spanning from 2008 to 2017. Remnants is a beautiful and awe-inspiring album, and at this time we are only planning to release this LP as part of the 3xLP Box Set (i.e. do not count on this being sold individually).
Also included is a large amount of digital content, including WAV & MP3 downloads of all LP audio, plus 23 bonus tracks of instrumentals and outtakes.
Vinyl Specifics:
3xLPs housed in a matte-laminated box set with spot-gloss, limited to 500 hand-numbered copies.
At War With Walls & Mazes (2008)
- Marbled Blue & Black vinyl color configuration.
- 12" 150gm virgin vinyl, limited to 500.
- Reimagined cover art by Joshue Ott.
- Download of instrumental tracks of the full album.
We Are Rising (2011)
- Milky Clear with Magenta Smoke vinyl color configuration.
- 12" 150gm virgin vinyl, limited to 500.
- Download of instrumental tracks of the full album.
Remnants (2019)
- Electric Blue color vinyl.
- 12" 150gm virgin vinyl, limited to 500.
- Three bonus digital tracks.
WATCH / SHARE - Son Lux "Sleep" Official Mood Video:
