Hidden Shoal News
Markus Mehr – New Video & Forthcoming Album
We’re proud to announce the forthcoming release of Re-Directed, the sixth album by experimental German artist Markus Mehr. The album will see release via Hidden Shoal on the 29th of April. The first taste of the album is available now thanks to the amazing music video for the track ‘Re-Directed 4’, directed by German experimental video artist Stefanie Sixt.
“pushing his emotionally-charged sonic sculptures into much more dangerous and unpredictable territory… Totally mesmerizing and beautiful.” – Decoder Magazine on Binary Rooms
Re-Directed is a confrontational soundwork of digital surrealism, underpinned by a potent and timely theme: our dependence upon digital technology and communication, and how this dependence renders us vulnerable to exploitation. The project originated as an audiovisual performance with long-time collaborator Stefanie Sixt, for which Markus Mehr recorded hours of sound from servers, hard disks and mobile phones using induction microphones, rendering the inaudible audible and bringing the background noise of digital life into focus. Mehr’s lens is trained on our uncritical reliance upon the invisible systems that infiltrate our everyday lives, silently eating away at our capacity for self-determination.
Perhaps the most confrontational and abstract release in Mehr’s discography thus far, Re-Directed challenges the narrow confines of music, moving towards the realm of musique concrète. It demands active engagement from the listener, alongside acknowledgement of its conceptual nature. As challenging and complex as it may be, Re-Directed is an incredibly powerful and immersive listening experience for those willing to undertake the journey on Mehr’s terms.
New Chloe March EP, Remixes & Video!
Hidden Shoal is excited to present the release of The Orpheus Pavement, the new six-track EP by English artist Chloë March, featuring new song ‘The Orpheus Pavement’, along with two originals from her acclaimed album Nights Bright Days and three remixes (by Lvmark, Sam Atkin, and Chloë March).
The Orpheus Pavement is dreamy, slow–motion pop music, pulsating with sensuality. Listening to the EP feels like surreptitiously ingesting laudanum and wandering half-dazed through a secret garden that’s slowly shifting and warping around you. As with so much of Chloë March’s work, it was inspired by the mythical – the largest Roman mosaic ever found in Britain, which depicts Orpheus charming nymphs, tigers and other creatures with his songs. In this instance, the story is just the start, as March’s compositions bloom from reverberating piano and voice into evocative soundworlds that contain multitudes. Two of the songs are further transformed by remixers Lvmark, Sam Atkin, and March herself, into shimmering refractions of their former selves.
“a luminous voice, a smoky alto that unfurls like a plume of cigarette smoke, its velvety tone a sensual narcotic… it’s hard not to think of the mythological sirens who used their hypnotic voices to lure sailors ashore” – textura
Oft compared to singular artists such as Nina Simone, Beth Gibbons and Elizabeth Fraser, Chloë March follows her own independent path, writing, engineering and producing from her home studio in south-east England. Inhabiting musical territory somewhere between art song and folk, dream-pop and electronica, the ambient and the cinematic, March embraces all these influences to create poetic, emotionally charged and intensely atmospheric songs and soundworlds. Lvmark is an electronic music producer hailing from Northern Sweden, drawing influence from the isolation and vastness of his homeland to create echoing electronica. Sam Atkin is a Fremantle-based ambient and experimental producer operating out of his shed-bedroom, who released his debut album Gently, Quietly in 2015 through Workplace Safety CDRs, and has been keeping it slow and sad ever since.
The Orpheus Pavement is available now via BandCamp and the usual digital stores. You can also check out the title track and the two remixes by Lvmark and Sam Atkin at the Hidden Shoal SoundCloud. Chloe has also produced a beautiful music video for ‘The Orpheus Pavement’ which you can check out over at YouTube.
New Antonymes Album Now Available for Pre-Order
We’re excited to announce the availability of pre-orders for Antonymes‘ new album (For Now We See) Through A Glass Dimly, which features contributions from Christoph Berg (Field Rotation), composer Stefano Guzzetti, James Banbury (The Auteurs), Joanna Swan (Ilya) and writer Paul Morley, with mixing by Stefano Guzzetti and Paul Humphreys (OMD), and mastering by Rafael Anton Irisarri (The Sight Below).
The 10-track CD comes in a glorious six-panel full-colour card sleeve with 8-page insert. Album pre-orders include the immediate download of the 2 pre-release tracks (‘Delicate Power’ and ‘Towards Tragedy and Dissolution’), plus the complete album the moment it’s released. Orders are shipped on or around 21 April 2016. Head to Antonymes Bandcamp and secure yourself a copy of this incredible album.
Glanko & Daniel Bailey Sign to Hidden Shoal
We’re excited to welcome the wonderful Glanko & Daniel Bailey to the Hidden Shoal family. The pair collaborated on the sublime forthcoming EP Isometrik, which will see release through Hidden Shoal on 5th May 2016 and is now available as part of the Hidden Shoal licensing catalogue.
Glanko & Daniel Bailey create music at the intersection of soundscape and song, where field recordings and loops play as important a role as piano and guitar. Their debut Isometrik EP is evidence of the kind of alchemy that can only be conjured when two creative minds are perfectly in tune. Rich with textural counterpoint, these brooding yet innately melodic pieces envelope the listener with their intensity and grace.
Glanko and Daniel Bailey are old friends who have walked different artistic paths. Glanko has been an IDM/glitch/industrial producer since 2012, while Daniel Bailey has been a singer, guitarist and songwriter in various alternative rock bands, and is also working on a solo project.
Their collaboration began in Italy in December 2015, mainly focused on experimentation and combining their unique sensibilities. The result is the Isometrik EP, conceived and recorded during a short stay in Monti Picentini, Italy.
Giuseppe Musmeci of HC-B and Willem Gator Interview at Tomatrax
For those that missed it, check out this wonderful interview with Giuseppe Musmeci of HC-B and Willem Gator at Tomatrax late last year. Giuseppe is currently finalising the next Willem Gator album so keep your ears peeled for more news on that. It’s going to be something special!Memorybell Signs to Hidden Shoal
Hidden Shoal is proud to announce the signing of the brilliant Colorado based artist Memorybell to it’s roster of artists. Memorybell is the ambient project of Grant Hazard Outerbridge, a multi-instrumentalist and classically trained pianist who has been playing music for nearly 30 years. In February 2014, Outerbridge awoke in a hospital with no memory of how he had arrived. He was diagnosed with transient global amnesia, a condition that causes the brain to temporarily stop making new memories. When he returned to the piano, Outerbridge found his previous compositions sounded garish. He pared them down to their essence and, along with new, more spacious material, constructed a set of variegated and subtle songs that explore the interplay between dissonance and silence. The result is the debut Memorybell album Obsolete, created using just a creaky grand piano and two microphones, which is as concerned with exploring the spaces between notes as the notes themselves, giving each song room to breath and encouraging the ear to wander.
Obsolete will see release through Hidden Shoal on the 2nd June 2016 with the first taste of the album dropping mid-April. This amazing collection of compositions is also now available as part of the Hidden Shoal licensing catalogue. Read more on Memorybell here.
New Antonymes Single from His Forthcoming Album
Hidden Shoal is proud to announce the release of ‘Towards Tragedy and Dissolution’, the stunning new single by acclaimed neo-classical ambient artist Antonymes, taken from the forthcoming album (For Now We See) Through A Glass Dimly. The track is available for streaming now via SoundCloud.
Sonically minimal yet emotionally formidable, ‘Towards Tragedy and Dissolution’ features the stirring string arrangements of James Banbury (The Auteurs) and Christoph Berg (Field Rotation), which engage in reflective conversation with Ian M. Hazeldine’s plaintive piano. Its emotional potency and compositional dexterity draws you into an evocative world, demanding engagement.
In addition to James Banbury and Christoph Berg, (For Now We See) Through A Glass Dimly also includes contributions from composer Stefano Guzzetti, Joanna Swan (Ilya) and writer Paul Morley. Mixed by Stefano Guzzetti and Paul Humphreys (OMD), and mastered by Rafael Anton Irisarri (The Sight Below), the album’s depth of sound is awe-inspiring. It is released by Hidden Shoal on 21st April 2016.
Kramies Featured at Soul Kitchen
Check out the lovely live, lo-fi acoustic version of the Kramies‘ track ‘The Fate That Never Favoured Us’ over at the excellent Soul Kitchen webzine. The performance was filmed in the haunted(!) woods of Ohio last year. While you’re in the mood for live Kramies be sure to download his latest EP, forêts antiques, which documents tracks from his 2015 live show in France. The EP is available as a free download.
Markus Mehr to Perform at Bertolt Brecht Festival
We’re excited to announce that on Monday 29th February, Markus Mehr will be performing live in a trio alongside vocalist Isabell Münsch and saxophonist Kay Fischer as part of Augsburg’s Brecht Festival, which runs from 26th February until Sunday 6th March, celebrating the work of famous playwright Bertolt Brecht. Their performance addresses the issue of “coming home”, and is based on material that Brecht wrote during his exile in the USA among other works.
Markus is currently putting the finishing touches to his new album Re-Directed, due for release on Hidden Shoal on 30th April, with the first taste of the album appearing in March. In the meantime be sure to check our his brilliant album of 2015 Binary Rooms.
Liminal Drifter In Top 10 For SBS Chill’s “Chillest 100”!
How’s this for exciting news – Liminal Drifter‘s ‘Soothed by Summer‘ just scooped the number 10 spot on SBS Chills’ “Chillest 100”! The track is lifted from his debut album Troubled Mystic. Liminal is hanging out with some esteemed company in the form of Massive Attack, Moby, Air, Sebastien Tellier and Ella Fitzgerald and many others. A brilliant achievement for a sublime track. Check out the full list including a Spotify playlist on the SBS website.
If you haven’t yet had the pleasure to soak in Troubled Mystic then you should need no further nudging. Apart from a suite of gorgeous ambient electronica and ambient pop instrumentals you’ll also find tracks featuring the stunning vocals of Chloe March. It’s an album for the ages, trust us. Grab Troubled Mystic and ‘Soothed by Summer’ via iTunes or Bandcamp.
Hidden Shoal MixTape
