Ian William Craig is a trained operatic vocalist who combines his voice with analogue synthesizers, reel-to-reel machines, and faulty tape decks to create sublime cascades of unpredictable decay and beauty. His music engages with the operatic and orchestral, submerging them under a shifting palette of vocal improvisations, analogue tape hiss and billowing clouds of erasure. As well as a talented musician, Craig is an award-winning printmaker. Originally from Edmonton, he began playing live under his own name in 2010 in Vancouver, where he currently works at the University of British Columbia running the printmaking studio for the fine arts department. Though classically trained and grounded in the choral tradition, Craig’s early albums were concentrated predominantly around the piano, with his voice merely a marginal presence. In recent years, however, his practice has come to focus increasingly around his powerful voice, as can again be witnessed on Centres.
Ian's first release for FatCat’s pioneering 130701 imprint (Max Richter, Hauschka, Dustin O’Halloran, Jóhann Jóhannsson, etc) Centres is actually his ninth full-length album, the majority of which were self-released digitally or in limited cassette editions. His last two full lengths (‘A Turn of Breath’, 2014; and ‘Cradle for the Wanting’, 2015) were issued physically on the excellent California label, Recital Program and received glowing press and placements in numerous critics’ end of year lists (including Mojo / NY Times / Rolling Stone). The Guardian marveled how “to be both wildly experimental and fantastically listenable is a skill that precious few people possess, but Craig has it … truly brilliant,” whilst Mojo remarked on "a blissfully disquieting choral suite, moving from the corroded cries of counter-tenor ghosts to a kind of abstract Buckleyesque hearbreak, as if some lovelorn romantic troubadour had been summoned forth from the recording of séances on old shellac 78s."
About Centres:
Fundamentally distressed yet texturally lush, Centres is an immensely deep, rich and rewarding listen. It was recorded in an assortment of studio and other locations across his Vancouver hometown: in concert halls and classrooms; train-yards and live rooms, as well as Craig’s own home. It was created using a mixture of sources - synthesizer, Hammond organ, guitar, accordion, wire recorder, loop station, Craig’s array of re-purposed tape decks and “cassette choir”. The songs were created manipulating tape loops through two or three decks at once to create strange deteriorating delays with different colors. Craig would then circuit-bend the bias to create odd kinds of distortion, or bend the sound back into itself so it feeds back in unpredictable ways.
Continually honing and pushing this process, the album shows a quite brilliant attention to textural detail. Morphing, swirling, scouring, shimmering, it continually expands and contracts around you. Forging a harmonically gorgeous and utterly immersive listening experience, it pulls you from the rousing, slow-build of the opening ‘Contain (Astoria Version)’ through the standout ‘A Single Hope’, with its huge bass and Hammond organ swells, and through shifting cloud-zones of ‘Drifting to Void on All Sides’ or ‘Power Colour Spirit Animal’, the Nico-esque accordion opening of ‘The Nearness’, and back to the cyclical ending of ‘Contain (Cedar Version)’, one of the cleanest and sparest tracks here - pared back to the purity of a single voice and guitar.
Centres is an astounding album that stands with a similarly unique sense of vision and integrity as the likes of William Basinski or Colin Stetson.
With Michael Plaster of SoulWhirlingSomewhere on vocals
Featuring Sam’s delicate acoustic guitar work and a stirring vocal performance from Michael Plaster (and drums from The Dresden Doll’s Brian Viglione), these four songs are interconnected, intimate stories of a broken heart. Bike Shop, Sam’s fifth consecutively-funded Kickstarter project, displays the tenderest side of Blacktape.
Only one of the four songs will be included on Black Tape For A Blue Girl’s August 12th CD. These fleeting moments, their 11th studio album, is 70 minutes of powerful, gorgeously yearning tracks, born from the same place as their classic 90s releases Remnants of a deeper purity and A chaos of desire.
Sam says, “The tracks on the EP are quite different from the ones on the album; they are sparse and sensitive pieces written for Michael’s vocals. They’re up close and personal reflections on places and moments, asking how things fell apart. I wrote ‘Bike shop’ and when Michael got involved I quickly wrote three additional songs to tell more of the story of the character. But these weren’t the direction I was taking the album. I decided to put them together on this EP as a stand-alone piece outside the context of These fleeting
The EP can be pre-ordered now! Not only on vinyl, but can be streamed or download on Bandcamp as well.
The organisation of WGT 2016 recently announced a whole bunch of names that has to be added to the already impressive line-up:
AGONOIZE (D) , DÉCEMBRE NOIR (D) , ESPLENDOR GEOMÉTRICO (E) , HENRIC DE LA COUR (S) , I LIKE TRAINS (GB) , PORTION CONTROL (GB) , SPETSNAZ (S) , TEST DEPT:REDUX (GB) , THE OCEAN (D) , THE SEXORCIST (D) , ALEXANDER NYM (D) , ANDI HARRIMAN (USA) , ANITA STEINER (D) , BELEN RUALES AGUILAR (YV) , BENJAMIN SCHMIDT (D) , BJÖRN BRÜNNICH (D) , CAROLINA SIRUI-CAO (D) , CHRISTIAN VON ASTER (D) , DAVID TIMM (D) , DENNY WILKE (D) , DIRK LEHMANN (D) , DUO LIED KUNST (D) , ELBISH ROCK
(D) , ELISABETH NEUSER (D) , EMILY HOPPE (D) , ENSEMBLE AMARILLI (D) , EVE MARTY (F) , FINISTERRE TANGO (RA) , HENDRIK SCHNÖKE (D) , ISABELGABBE (D) , JOANA GÖTTSCHE (D) , JOHANNA MAENNIKE (D) , JÖRG RICHTER (D) , JULIANE BREINL (D) , KARL-HEINZ GEORGI (D) , KATHRIN CHRISTIANS (D) , LEX WOHNHAAS (D) , LUCI VAN ORG (D) , LUKAS DREYER (D) , LYDIA BENECKE (D) , LYDIA GORSTEIN (D) , LYDIA KAVINA (D) , MARK BENECKE (D) MARKO KRUPPE (D) , MARKUS HEITZ (D) , MATTHIAS MÜLLER (D) ,
MENDELSSOHNORCHESTER LEIPZIG (D) , MORITZ EGGERT (D) , SASCHA BLACH (D) , SASKIA ETZOLD (D) , SEBASTIAN TAUBERT (D) , STEPHAN MEINER (D) , SVEN GEIPEL (D) , THALIA LAUER (D) , THOMAS MANEGOLD (D) , ULF WALLIN (D) , VEIT ETZOLD (D) , WOLFRAM KUHNT (D)
On May 27th, Metropolis Records will be releasing "The Burning Bridge," the first new material from the New York City based trio NOIR since their debut album Darkly Near in late 2013.
"The Burning Bridge," featuring vocalist Athan Maroulis (Spahn Ranch, Executive Slacks, Black Tape for a Blue Girl) was written by Maroulis and Erik Gustafson (16volt, Adoration Destroyed). An exclusive extended version of the song "The Burning Bridge" will also be released on the CD compilation Electronic Saviors Volume 4 in June. "The Burning Bridge" EP will also feature a cover of a very early Ministry song from 1982 entitled "Same Old Madness," along with a cover of Duran Duran's "The Chauffeur."
Also, "In Every Dream Home A Heartache" a Roxy Music song which appeared on NOIR's Darkly Near is also included here but is a live version recorded on WFMU radio on December 12th, 2013. Featuring Athan Maroulis on vocals, backing vocals and keyboards by Kai Irina Hahn and Demetra Songs along with programming and keyboards by Erik Gustafson.
"The Burning Bridge" is dedicated to David Bowie.
From the gutters of south Sweden, Liv “Sin” Jagrell emerged as a major force as the vocalist for hard rockers Sister Sin. Throughout their 13 year career, Sister Sin sold thousands of albums and toured the world with high profile tours supporting the likes of Slayer and King Diamond on the Rockstar Mayhem festival tour, as well as being a part of the Revolver Magazine ”Hottest Chicks in Metal” tour. Sister Sin toured relentlessly for over a decade across Europe and North America garnering an intensely loyal following of rockers that craved the band’s aggressive and melodic brand of hard rock.
When Sister Sin called it quits at the end of 2015, Liv knew that she had much more to give to her fans. From this, LIV SIN was born. Liv is currently working on a new music that shows the power, sexiness, and attitude that she is known for. Liv says ”for me it has never been an option to stop singing. I live for the stage and for my fans. I still miss Sister Sin, but I am very excited to work on my own project, and I can promise it will not be some soft pop rock. This is going to be metal deluxe, because that’s who I am!" LIV SIN offers a modernized hard rock sound to take Liv into her next phase, a sound that is destined to please both new fans and her longtime fans of Sister Sin.
