Ramifications is the result of a collaboration between Z’EV and Marinos Koutsomichalis. The work comprises of Organ recordings (employing the Sir Jack Lyons Concert Hall Organ in York) which have been time-stretched and digitally processed in a various ways before they have been finally diffused and re-recorded in A.S. Rymer Auditorium using 5 Genelec 1038B loudspeakers, a Genelec 7060B subwoofer, and a pair of Neumann KM184 microphones.

1st edition of 100 copies (December 2014): DVD-R in black envelope, housed in custom made carton sleeve with card insert.

Cover artwork and design: Antonis Kalagkatsis

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Marinos Koutsomichalis (Athens, 1981) is an artist and researcher. Via sound and a wide range of other media he interrogates the specifics of site, perception, technology and material. His work has been widely presented internationally in museums, galleries, festivals, music halls, academies, industrial sites, churches, research institutions, conferences, underground venues, scientific journals, independent music labels, and elsewhere.
marinoskoutsomichalis.com

Z’EV is a conceptual artist, poet and sound sculptor. After studying at CalArts with concrete Poet Emmett Williams he concentrated on producing visual and sound poetries, and was included in the “Second Generation” show at the Museum of Conceptual Art in San Francisco in 1975. He has been one of the progenitors of the ‘industrial movement’ since the end of the 1970’s, through his work with catacoustic (reflected sound-based) metal percussion.
rhythmajik.com

Vinculum (Coincidence) is the latest installment from Coppice’s archive of sonic artifacts. The original piece was conceived as a site-specific performance and was presented at Without You I Am Nothing: Interactions, a performance series curated by Tricia Van Eck for the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. The composition revolved around the intersections between two accordions, four speakers with aleatoric pre-recorded material, spatial / temporal intervals and audience flow. It was performed for a total of 14 hours between February 8-13, 2011.

A special studio arrangement of the recordings, cut to the length of this CD, was developed between May 2011 and November 2012. The accordion duo score recordings were engineered by Todd A. Carter in June 2011 at Experimental Sound Studio in Chicago.

From Tricia Van Eck’s liner notes:

‘Vinculum (Coincidence) consisted of four speakers placed in the gallery amidst large works by Vito Acconci, Chris Burden, Dan Peterman, Adrian Piper, and Andrea Zittel. The speakers – reverberating through the normally quiet space – played aleatoric pre-recorded sounds that initially seemed like breaths or wind blowing but then altered or transformed as if mechanical parts hissing and whooshing across and through the space. Once these speakers were on, Noé Cuéllar and Joseph Kramer stoically entered, each with an accordion. People walking by the galleries – where sound is not normally present – upon hearing the hypnotic yet enigmatic sounds from within, would often stop and try to locate what it was and where it was coming from. Seeing one or both of the performers and their accordions would not necessarily answer their confusion. Some would walk away perplexed, while others would be drawn in. Once inside, the effects of the performance were individualized and subjective. Some, perhaps realizing that their movements intersected the score, chose to remain motionless, while others moved around the gallery seemingly looking and testing how the different sculptures absorbed or reverberated the sounds. Some, perhaps musicians, appeared to be acutely listening as if discerning patterns and phrasing of melodies and breaths. Still others were interested solely in the performers – imitating their stances or interrupting their silences by talking with them. Most intriguing to me, was how sculptural the performers, the sounds, and by extension, the audience became. It was as if Vinculum (Coincidence), with its continuous droning of tones, breaths, and modulations, froze or at least slowed the viewers as they walked among the objects in the gallery, as if coalescing into a spatio-temporal synchronous whole. It was if by listening, the audience could tenuously hold the experience, the shifting sounds, and themselves together, in space with each other.’

Further info about the composition can be found here.

1st edition of 100 copies (December 2014): red CD-R’s in plastic jacket stuffed with nesting booklets and sticker.

Cover & Design:  Coppice

Liner notes: Coppice and Tricia Van Eck

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“What is audible on record is a rawer, more cleanly ‘acoustic’ sound from the two accordions compared with the multiple layers of tape manipulations that Coppice is known for. The simplicity and directness of the first track, for example, in which pumping sounds flick from left to right over a quiet background murmur, earns its place amongst the duo’s finest work to date. At other times, the lack of refinement and variety perhaps suits intermittent attention better than full-on sustained engagement (the liner notes’ suggestion is that the album should be listened to on ‘shuffle’). I would love to see a live realisation of “Vinculum (Coincidence)” and explore the numerous coincidences of space, installation, performer, and audience opened up by the work. In lieu of that possibility, this recorded version offers a fresh and stripped-down take on the music of Coppice.”  (Fluid Radio)

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Since its foundation in 2009, Chicago-based Noé Cuéllar & Joseph Kramer have departed from bellows and electronics to create original compositions, installations, discography, instruments, arrangements for performance, software, and sculptural objects. Drawing from their expanding glossary of study, the duo is currently focused on the development of new technologies and objects for installation and live repertoire with custom instruments, and electromagnetic and pneumatic processes. Recently praised for “blurring sounds and centuries,” Coppice music has been released internationally, recently by Quakebasket (US), Triple Bath (GR), Consumer Waste (UK), and Senufo Editions (IT). Coppice has appeared at numerous settings and festivals in Chicago and the US, and internationally in Iceland, Sweden, Greece, and the Netherlands.

http://www.futurevessel.com/coppice/

begin _if_ (3) is the third installment in an ongoing series of sound works by Berlin-based sound artist Christoph Limbach. Previous editions have been released on Richard Garet’s Contour Editions (begin _if_ (1), 2009) and Modisti (begin _if_ (2), 2010). The series was first conceived in 2005 in Madrid and finally brought to life in 2009 in Berlin, combining both field recordings and studio work, embracing cutting techniques that are common in visual design and audio post-production for film, fusing concrete sounds and improvisation. The series is following a wider lose concept that comes after different practices and approaches to sound that interacts with each release’s different and distinct physical or nonphysical medium. Inspired by Hidden Variable Theories and following a concept that ultimately remains hidden to the listener, begin _if_ (3) sees Limbach delve into the tape as sound carrier and celebrate tape hiss and saturation as compositional materials. Created in studio, the work includes field recordings made in Tokyo and Berlin, vinyl and tape manipulations, unprocessed instrumental sounds and bits and pieces from different locations and practices of sound work.

1st edition of 60 copies (June 2014): pro-duplicated cassettes in plastic case.

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Christoph Limbach is a sound artist based in Berlin. His focus has always been on sound but his background in applied physics and film projects has an outstanding influence on his current sound works, using film editing techniques and film sound aesthetics for his sound pieces and live performances. He has released his works on labels such as Contour Editions, Staaltape, Modisti, Framework Radio and more. He does sound engineering and installation for John Bock in addition to production and mastering work at Emitter19 Studios. Together with Pierce Warnecke he curates the Emitter Micro festival and label.

With A Cogent Heavy High-Technology Works Paris-based artist Strom Varx continues his research into seismic noise dynamics and delicate stillness, unleashing over 60 minutes of digital craftsmanship. In his own words “the result is a kind of electronic music that is perennial, futuristic, sensible, provocative and profoundly romantic; music that does not fit to any particular groupings”. Fragments of Karkowskian aggression encounter sections that bring to mind Kevin Drumm’s latest efforts in quietness.

1st edition of 100 copies (June 2014): black cd-r in black envelope, housed in custom made carton sleeves.

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Strom Varx is a composer, artistic director, photographer, designer and producer based in Paris. Since 2005, he has been presenting and developing his work in variable contexts in France and in Europe: Palais de Tokyo, Théâtre de l’Odéon, Nuit Blanche Paris, Le Fresnoy, Arte Radio… He has shared the stage with Merzbow, Eliane Radigue, Sunn O))), Gert-Jan Prins, The Hafler Trio, Mika Vainio, Thomas Köner, Wolf Eyes, Kouhei Matsunaga, Oren Ambarchi, Richards Pinhas, KK.Null and others. He has collaborated with Otomo Yoshihide, Kasper T. Toeplitz and Zbigniew Karkowski. In addition to his artistic practices, Strom Varx also rages as a cultural activist in Paris under the label of his creative studio imagenumérique™.

The Obliquity Of the Solar Rays In The Vicinity Of The Pole was recorded live at ParisHippolytestudio.  Strom Varx uses only electronic media.

1st edition of 150 copies (August 2012): cdr, carton sleeve, plastic envelope.

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“Quite a dark work at times, but also glitchy, broken and chopped up at another point in time” (Frans de Waard – Vital Weekly)

“Après une entrée percussive et sauvage aux accents xenakiens, c’est une plongée dans l’infinie sidérale sans vie mais pas sans activités sonores, souffles, parasites et autres grondements telluriques, pour poursuivre dans des résonances perturbées et hantées d’une très lente mélodie” (Jerome Noetinger – Metamkine)

“отличный цифровой нойз; вдумчивый редукционизм; атмосферный дрон” (Илья Белоруков – cnmag)

Marinos Koutsomichalis & Theo Burt @ V22, London

Agxivatein’s showcase for the sound/space festival in the V22 Summer Club in Bredsmonsdey featured a talk and a live audio performance by Marinos Koutsomichalis along with a live audiovisual performance by Theo Burt.

Two faces, two approaches which reveal the same enigma: that of sounds shaped in the moment of their own creation, by way of the simple contact of fingers, or of electricity passing through the internal circuits of the modified devices – or perhaps the amplification of materials, rather than objects. Inviting the most basic kinds of accident, resulting from unstable and minimal constructs, or from a more than simply intuitive handling, sometimes becoming accidents of accidents – either way you might say that the hand is the real instrument which, by way of clever tricks, vibrations, vague movements or tremors, stamps the sound with an indeterminacy which connects it directly to the organic.

Nadir was recorded in 2011 in barcelona, under these premises.

Juan Matos Capote : home made oscillators
Alfredo Costa Monteiro : electro-acoustic devices

1st edition of 150 copies (July 2012): printed cdr, 2-side carton sleeve, plastic envelope

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“Radical music, going from extreme loudness to extreme deepness [..] not for the weak of heart” (Frans de Waard – Vital Weekly)

“Le tout fait penser à un Francisco Lopez qu’on aurait plongé dans le bitume chaud” (Pierre Cecile – Le Son du Grisli)

“Explore l’électronique et l’électricité du quotidien à la recherche d’un fantôme mystérieux” (Jerome Noetinger – Metamkine)

John Cage’s 33 1/3 @ Knot gallery, Athens

The first ever Greek (and second European) exhibition of John Cage’s 33 1/3.  An open-ended participatory installation for 8 turntables and hundreds of records.

Originally a four-channel sound installation (two channels via open headphones, two via ceiling speakers) presented May 28 – June 10, 2010 as 9/12 in the ‘Phonebox’ series at IMO, Copenhagen, Denmark.  ‘Apparatus’ was composed April-May 2010, using basic sound material recorded 2005-2010 in Austria, Brazil, Germany, Italy, Namibia and South Africa.

1st edition of 150 copies (October 2011): printed cdr, carton sleeve, vellum inlet, plastic envelope.

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“Tout simplement excellent !” (Jerome Noetinger – Metamkine)

“From therapeutic/organic to dis-junctive/phony, like some sort of animatronic backdrop.” (Animal Psi)

“It marks an interesting break [..] and is by no means a lesser work for him. If this is something of a new direction, I’d be keen to hear more.” (Frans De Waard Vital Weekly)