monopoly child star searchers / dolphins into the future ~ tour dates

 

neo fourth world age post drone alien psychedelia living legends monopoly child star searchers and dolphins into the future are on tour which just started yesterday! 

25 cities in 12 countries:

23/5 Barcelona 🇪🇸  El Pumarejo
24/5 A Coruña 🇪🇸 Acefala
25/5 Vigo 🇪🇸 Radar Estudios
26/5 Porto 🇵🇹 Hotelier
27/5 Coimbra 🇵🇹
29/5 Parede 🇵🇹 SMUP
30/5 Lisbon 🇵🇹 Sala Lisa
31/5 Paris 🇫🇷 Cmptrmthmtcs
1/6 Ljubjana 🇸🇮 Niansa
2/6 Ravenna 🇮🇹 Magma
3/6 Palermo 🇮🇹 Epyc
4/6 Milano 🇮🇹 Caned Icoda
5/6 Roma 🇮🇹 Teatro Delle Belleze
6/6 Perugia 🇮🇹 Spazio Modu
7/6 Prague 🇨🇿 Punctum
8/6 Vienna 🇦🇹
9/6 Sofia 🇧🇬 Equipage
11/6 Tampere 🇫🇮 Telakka
12/6 Turku 🇫🇮 Himera
13/6 Stockholm 🇸🇪 Larry’s Corner
14/6 Ghotenburg 🇸🇪 Skjulet
15/6 Samsø 🇩🇰 Agerupgard
18/6 Brussels 🇧🇪 Atelier 210
19/6 Roubaix 🇫🇷 Ateliers Jouret
22/6 Antwerp (Monopoly only)🇧🇪 De  

•••

for infos check insta here & here

also, for the occasion Edições CN is producing 4 tour-only editions.
these will only be available at the concerts and Spencer just put 3 new tapes out along the HR Giger's Studiolo vinyl reissue!

uton / antti tolvi / lieven m. moana

uton ~ ummet ja lammet (ikuisuus, 2015)

«Experimental electronic studies with psychedelic flavours. Connections to the cosmic currents and invisible beings from the other worlds and dimensions, our collective dimension included. Music to help listener to breathe through its energy centers (chakras), or even from the core of the existence. Sounds to travel in astral ways, and explore the unknown, eyes closed or open - works well with both ways». ikuisuus

I always felt something ironic behind those weird sounds of Uton. Flirting with new age terms and ideas and still remaining truly Finnish noise in composition & sound – I can clearly imagine some yoga coach woman playing this tape in afternoon patio for her pupils... Eyes closed, all sitting in lotus posture... Listening to true inner selves... And suddenly alien invasion begins, starting from that patio: huge UFOs descending out of nowhere, lasers blasting all over the place, screams and panic and that tape continues to roll meanwhile. 

Maybe I listened too much new age tapes from '80s, but seriously – what meditation and yoga practice have in common with these collages of weird noises, playful sound effects and overall atmosphere of kindergarten merriment? But okay, let's not be boring and say that this tape is actual true and 100% new age, but from another solar system. Why not? We sent them gold plate with Bach, after all... If you ever read to vedic literature, it says that there are billions of planets with different kinds of intelligent creatures, but all of them share idea of Hinduism in a way, all being part of Brahman creation and Vedic cosmology. So, if we have chakras and they do, maybe we should establish connection not with prohibitively expensive antennas and computers, but in meditation state? Same energy, same vibrations, only different languages. But prana is universal, meditation state is universal, so let's use it as new internet! Actually, I almost sure that Jani Hirvonen already does it in his cosy apartment. And maybe they already here, among us. Who knows? The truth is out there. 

 

try ~ buy tape 

antti tolvi / lieven m. moana ~ tolvi moana (edicoes cn, 2015)

«To get to know the people, is to walk in their footsteps. Thus by walking Corvo Island’s only road, the Estrada Do Caldeirão, I entered the mind of her dwellers». lieven m. moana

«The idea for these pieces came up when I heard Lieven’s side – early version – for this split cassette. The idea was to make music which is the same as, and also totally different from Lieven’s side. I decided to make different set ups with my analog synths, and let them play themselves. Then do field recordings out of those». antti tolvi

Many artists are working with field recording genre nowadays. Why not, when it seems so easy – buy recorder, go to some place exotic, keep your mouth shut and ears open. But, of course, this is only the surface. There are many field recordings serving as documentation of places and events, released without any editing. And there is completely different thing, when field recordings are used as composition material: not as sample, which may be processed through many effects, but as an instrument itself. Idea is not new, there are some huge names like Francisco López or Slawek Kwi working that way, but work of Lieven M. Moana is probably something different, and not only because he prefers tape recorders and lo-fi aesthetics. Moana creates certain mythology, timeless presence of something bigger than just impression of the place. His recordings have pauses of silence, where you can actually feel more. Going back to John Cage's idea that music is everywhere where listener is, Moana finds another dimension of ever-present listener. He explores it, while visiting geographic locations and finds harmonic interaction between being subjective composer and detached field recordist. We don't have to be educated to feel harmony in things, but sometimes we need someone who will point at it. When  pause appear, you start hearing your own "island" – the one you live in. Have you listened to it today? 

And this brings us to the idea behind Antti Tolvi side of this tape – recording his synths playing themselves. Okay, he admits that failed in being independent observer and turned some knobs during the process, but this is what we do, when we walk away from crowded street, isn't it? Always turning knobs of our aural environment, we may forget doing that, thinking that everything just happens. Which brings us to John Cage again – if we found some sounds musical and other not, we acting like egoists, judging things for being noisy or uninteresting. Try to listen something you find unpleasant for your ears and ask yourself why you don't like it. Okay, this may go far into philosophy, and what we actually have on this tape is nice analogue drones and psychedelic ambient passages between them. But listening to this after Lieven's side makes difference. I can imagine these sounds being field recordings of some astronomical scale location, showing the huge picture of million-year-old nebula evolution with galaxies swirling all around it. And yes, I find it much more ear-pleasing than my neighbours yelling behind the wall. Am I egoist?

listen ~ buy digital

lieven martens moana

lieven martens moana ~ os canais (sicsic tapes, 2014)

"Two conceptual compositions.

~ Os Canais ~

Os Canais sprouted on a boat, while wavering inside an old canal system. Inside the memento of the hearth of altepepl Tenochtitlan. Where we dressed ourselves in the highstrung robes of history. And subconsciously warbled a symbolic counterpoint to flashes of the boiling torso being the current Ciudad De Mexico. And afterwards, our exhaled alphabet left sightless traces full of meaning. Like the diagrams in the sand, peering after a dance of the Judwalis. This collage is the ambiance which existed during an hour long interview for a documentary on Wietske Van Gils and myself, by Patrick Danse. These are the invisible traces of our motions, and our ideas, in between the words.

~ The Bird Sings (Variations) ~

The bird / mimicks the wind / The filter sings a fowl
And there is an a, a b and a c / all communed, in expectancy
Inside this magnetic tape / der Vogel singt" lieven martens moana

La carrera artística del poeta, compositor y visionario belga Lieven Martens ha sido una meditación profunda en torno a los resquicios de la naturaleza. Mucho de su material ha sido revisado y celebrado por este blog, así que cada noticia de Lieven siempre es una buena nueva. Su trabajo como Dolphins Into The Future, Duncan Cameron y Lieven Martens Moana (dejando fuera Cetacean Trancefers, Blobs, etc) funciona simultáneamente como la mirada de un científico y la de un explorador aficionado. Abstracto y exaltado, ensoñador y vitalista, su armazón imaginario (plagado por inocencia y asombro por lo demás abundante) devuelve al espacio natural no la noción artificiosa y exotista del espectáculo sino la condición ancestral del paisaje como piedra de encuentro del artista con un universo animista. Martens ha sabido llevar sus composiciones a territorios tan propios, tan exclusivos, que resulta muy difícil identificarlo a estas alturas del partido dentro de la tangente de sus contemporáneos inmediatos (James Ferraro, Spencer Clark, Orphan Fairytale, et al) si no es por cuestiones meramente personales o historiográficas.

Por lo demás, se podría decir que la insinuación del espacio sonoro (como generador de espacios imaginarios –Hawaii, Samoa, Ilha do Pico, etc– y como fenómeno propiamente acústico) es una de las constantes en su trabajo. La primera etapa de su trabajo (desde Duncan Cameron o Blobs  hasta su pseudónimo más conocido, Dolphins Into The Future) engloba una afinidad figurativa. “Ke Ala Ke Kua”, “Ke Mirning Pu’uwuai” o “The Voice of the Silence” son primordialmente recreaciones escénicas, pinturas sonoras (como él mismo las ha llegado a llamar) que insinúan el paisaje en la medida que lo componen. La faceta más reciente (una que se esboza en “Canto Archipelago” y termina tomando forma en “Writings” y trabajos posteriores) no es precisamente un distanciamiento tanto como una progresión. En “Os Canais”, su cinta más reciente editada por el sello alemán SicSic Tapes, el belga medita en torno a las posibilidades de presentar y transfigurar el paisaje al mismo tiempo. 

Grabado en los canales de Xochimilco, México, como parte de una visita del año pasado, el material se divide en dos partes. La primera, que da nombre al álbum, consta de una extensa grabación de campo integrada por los movimientos incidentales del canal mismo así como de sutiles modificaciones que el belga efectúa sobre la grabación. Al igual que las improvisaciones de campo de Lawrence English (“Suikinkutsu No Katawara Ni”), el sutil juego de Martens permite al escucha ser parte de ese espacio imaginado. La segunda parte, “The Bird Sings (Variations), es muy distinta. La referencia inmediata aquí sería el serialismo de Messiaen (quizá el devoto musical más ferviente de los pájaros), un compositor del que Lieven se declara abiertamente seguidor. Utilizando como punto de partida el cantar de los pájaros, los casi veinte minutos de la pieza se desintegran gradualmente en matices más abstractos (empezando con los pájaros y concluyendo con variaciones y manipulaciones análogo-digitales parecidas al Acto I de su “Music from the Guardhouse”), como si Lieven quisiera extraer algo fundamentalmente esencial del sonido de las aves.

En todo caso, ambas partes demuestran la capacidad artesana de Lieven, una que constantemente oscila entre esta posibilidad de figurar y alterar los espacios. Aún cuando “Os Canais” no parezca ser su obra totémica, la cinta deja ver que la investigación naturalista de Martens todavía tiene mucha luz que arrojar.  

listen ~ buy

dolphins into the future ~ lieven martens moana

dolphins into the future ~ lievens martens moana ~ songs of gold, incandescent (edições cn, 2014) 

"presenting five simple monaural tape collages, recorded over 5 years. These are culled from my growing collection of Dedication Symphonies. The proceedings start at the edge of the continent, and ending in the Gecko’s compass. Um Tratado … is a field recording, made in the boiling waters of a Fumarole. Being a composition as performed by the Mid Atlantic Ridge. Sweeten The Mango is a tonal story, as a response to the eponymous text by H-K Trask. Grotella exhales simple movements, toned by conventional instrumentation."

a puntito de salir 'os canais' en sicsic tapes, y saboreando todavía los maravillosos 'as canções de pele' y 'complementary music 2010 - 2013' junto a Eva Van Deuren, Hannah Friese, Wietske Van Gils y Francesco Cavaliere, abrimos las ventanas de par en par para que entre la brisa desde el planeta de Lieven Martens, un planeta especial que crece y crece dando vueltas sobre los mismos parámetros. 'esta cinta no representa un álbum, simplemente puros fragmentos', field recordings que Lieven ha ido grabando a lo largo de cinco años y que podrían ser casi una ampliación de 'the bells from above' o un compendio de todos sus viajes. hay tantas cosas bonitas en este disco...nadie como Lieven aprecia la belleza de la naturaleza, de un cri cri, de un kikirikí, de un cántico tribal, del ritmo como un latido animalesco.

'ilha da culatra (for wietske van gils, 2010)' es la selva en ebullición. el cielo. en 'um tratado sobre a agua quente (short version, for floris vanhoof, 2011)' Lieven capta el sonido de las aguas ardientes de una fumarola, una mezcla de gases y vapores que surgen por las grietas exteriores de un volcán a temperaturas muy altas. tan húmeda que dan ganas de bebértela. gorgoritmos, zumbidos, trinos y burbujeos con todos los instrumentos imaginables ~arsenal acústico de marimbas, xilófonos, dulcimer y bambú. los siete minutos de  'grotella (excerpts from a hula, dedicado a la coreógrafa belga siet raeymaekers, 2013)'' son como alucinaciones, como trozos del subsconciente. los acordes levemente distorsionados parecen interferencias de algún contacto alienígena o un theremín tocado bajo el agua. 'moo (for francesco cavaliere)' es obsesiva, diferente a cualquier cosa que haya compuesto nunca. Lieven se entrega totalmente a una música torturada, sin serlo, que él arranca a las máquinas, jugando a la ouija con teclados y micrófonos para dar vida a mantras tropicales que no se parecen a nada.

'sweeten the mango (instrumental version, for haunani-kay trask, 2012)' está interpretada por un coro de alguna tribu hawaiana, y de repente se convierte en algo triste y melancólico gracias a un piano que me recuerda a una escena inolvidable de 'cría cuervos' ...y de repente suenan las campanas y los pájaros y...hay algo magnético en el sonido delfín, en las teclas que toca y en cómo manipula las grabaciones de campo. en cómo convierte lo extraño, lo inhóspito, en algo propio. y lo hace de tal manera que siempre caes rendida. puede que, dada la inmensa cantidad de discos bajo distintos seudónimos, no sea fácil desenterrar todos los tesoros de Lieven Moana. resulta abrumador el hecho de, simplemente, querer tenerlo todo, ordenarlo, asimilarlo, pero merece mucho la pena hacerlo y sumergirte en su música al menos durante un día, una semana,...

listen ~ buy

dolphins into the future

 dolphins into the future ~ as canções de pele (edições cn, 2013)

"this is the soundtrack for a film, created for Silver Ghosts, an audio-visual company based in The Hague, The Netherlands. "as canções de pele" is a documentary, tracing the songs and movements of an imaginary volcanic island. it's a film in four chapters, sung by the goddess Pele. as being a Hula Dance, personating certain shapes, forces and lines. the footage was shot between september and december 2011, on the Açores Archipelago. the film was edited, mixed, and provided with a soundtrack, march 2012.  

note: since we felt that the "audio version" of this release should remain reminiscent to the video experience, we've chosen to not use the original recordings, yet offer the actual sound from the VHS tape. including all its inperfections, its hiss, buzz, and its little cuts, clicks, silences et al."

visuals: Wietske Van Gils, Lieven Martens Moana (hd camera, vhs tape, effect processor)
sound: Lieven Martens Moana (fm synthesizers, midi module, sampler, field recorder, tape recorder)
released by Silver Ghosts.

listen ~ buy 

lieven martens moana

lieven martens moana ~  music from the guardhouse: a play for magnetic tape recorder (kraak, 2013)

"Lieven Martens Moana’s first album under his birth name marks an important shift in his oeuvre. while still indebted to the universe created under his moniker Dolphins Into The Future, ‘Music From The Guardhouse’ shows the Artist reaching the shores of his mental island, fully matured. this is where a new journey begins, a musical research program within the ‘composer genre’." kraak 

"here’s an LP from the man formerly known as Dolphins Into The Future, Lieven Martens Moana, a mixture of concretey field-recorded soundscapes, tape hiss, wibbly analogue synth tomfoolery and occasional spoken commentary which seems to be from Moana himself. on the first side alone we have a lengthy passage of hiss and field recordings and sporadic piano tinkles, followed by a wibbly midi-synth passage with abstract, brightly layered synths plinking and plonking in a chaotic yet relaxing manner which brings to mind the BBC Radiophonic Workshop and Vernon Elliott’s magical score from ‘The Clangers’, finishing on a field recorded beach scene with weirdly sped-up bird calls which sound totally alien. over on the other side is a single long track ‘As Falesias’, which opens with dramatic soundtracky neoclassicism before delving into plangent analogue soundscapery with a sinister edge, with lots of swelling, quavering drones and continued subtle orchestral touches which sound like they’ve been beamed in from the 1950s. It’s a weird alien nostalgic excursion which will confuse and relax you." norman records

 

listen ~ buy the lp