New Pseudonym

First of all - a new year seems to have sprung itself upon us...so it is historically necessary for me to wish you all a fruitful 365 days at this juncture.

With the new year's arrival, I bring news that is of great change to the gradually inching Audio Gourmet empire: I shall begin releasing Ambient works under another guise.
From this time forth, I shall be occasionally operating as 'Eyes Flutter Beneath', which is a name inspired from REM sleep (as I got thinking about dreams and the like).
I have completed the first release under this moniker, and it should be out very soon on an as yet un-specified netlabel near you.

In terms of how projects as Eyes Flutter Beneath will differ from that of Audio Gourmet, I am as yet unsure. I've adopted one or two new approaches to producing Ambient music, along with those I've learnt since writing as Audio Gourmet and fused them together to create a new manner of production. The first official release under the pseudonym 'Eyes Flutter Beneath' will reveal these subtle nuances; a natural progression within the confides of my journey as an experimental sound artist. If you can stay awake, that is!

You will be duly notified as and when the release is available for free download...

MDAC002 Monthly Discerning Audio Chart, DECEMBER 2008

With my ideas for the direction of the Discerning Audio Chart posts in their infancy, I've been giving some thought on where I'd like to develop them. So, for December, I shall be continuing the theme of publicising the ten 'stand-out' tracks of the month. Also, I shall add the year of release for each track, and extend the description a little. Where applicable, I shall provide direct links for downloading netlabel releases too...

I'm still going to keep the chart free from any rigid criteria. It's quite simply a 'what have you been listening to lately?' list. The charts will contain styles from accross the board, from Ambient, Dark Ambient, Prog-Rock, Post-Rock, Downbeat Electronica, Trip-Hop, Jazz, Funk, Acoustic, Neo-Folk, Tribal/Ethnic, Deep House, Tech-House, Minimal, Techno
Anything goes!

DECEMBER 2008

(in no particular order)

J.ARIF VERNER 'In The Colour Of Air' [2005]

TRACK

"Beautifully pleasant light Ambient here, with sounds of feint distant guitars and unfurling synth washes. It's the kind of Ambient music that makes you feel that sadness that is accompanied by an awe-struck smile."

NrvNet 'Music For Stargazing' [2008]

MIX
"My attention turned towards Ambient music fully since downloading some mixes from this very site in mid 2007. Here, NrvNet creates an excellent follow up to his previous Music or Stargazing mix. The first volume has been a regular on my night-time playlist ever since I discovered it over a year ago...This well selected blend of Ambient is punctuated by gentle field recordings. Don't be put off by the size of the file; the space it takes up is worth every kilobyte!"

download the mix here:

http://hydrogencafe.blogspot.com/2008/12/music-for-stargazing-vol-2.html

IGNEOUS FLAME 'Oxana' [2004]

ALBUM

"I seem to be discovering artists that are new to my music collection all the time, and I can't believe I hadn't stumbled accross this earlier! These are a collection of murky ethereal soundscapes with occasional glimmers of light, serving as an excellent sleep album."

SAWAKO 'Tears' [2006]

TRACK

"This is a very unusual piece of orchestral Ambient. The whole track has a quirky arrangement throughout, transporting the listener to times gone by. Mysterious whispers have the listener feeling on edge, and transported back to time gone by...before giving way to a much lighter compositions of acoustic guitar strums with accompanying sound effects and female vocals. With an overall feeling of melancholy, this track effortlessly moves between different moods and tones."

MARCONI UNION 'Distant' [2006]

ALBUM

"It's rare that I buy every track all in one go from an album. I very seldom buy the whole package, unless I get the feeling that the work as a whole is going to be a lasting 'classic' in the playlist. This album however, is one of those scarce few. Not only do the shimmering washes of electro-acoustic sounds and delicate nuances amount to a compelling listen, I am also very keen on the thought provoking writings and loose concepts behind the album. It's material that could amount to an essay of my own personal speculation and discoveries, but I think it's best left for the listener to ponder for themselves..."

TUU 'Shiva Ascending' [1995]

TRACK

"This is an old piece I stumbled accross, and it's an ethnic tribal affair. I'm not overly familiar with the artist, but I dowloaded a few tracks from them and shall be reading up on them.

It's nearly ten minutes of soundscape, which starts of with a constant ohm style drone, punctuated by metal clangs, clicks and bangs before giving way to the most eerie of instruments. The drone more or less stays constant throughout, but it's that special instrument that will really attract your attention..."

CHICK COREA "Inner Space" [2005]

TRACK

"Moving away from a largely Ambient month, here's an excellent piece of Jazz I purchased. My Jazz collection is quite small, as I have a highly selective attitude towards it. For me, Jazz is best appreciated live, rather than walking down the street, through my iPod headphones. But the pieces of Jazz I do have, I enjoy a lot. For me, finding jazz that is listenable at home/on my iPod is a slow but very rewarding affair...and this track is certainly one of those that will feature prominently in my Jazz playlist for years to come."

OFF THE SKY "Dwelling Spells" [2008]

ALBUM

"New on the Zymogen netlabel, Off The Sky's Jason Corder has conjured a small collection of beautiful Ambient pieces. I've downloaded most of Jason's netlabel stuff, and would class myself as a big fan of his work. This release features tones and melody that could have been derived from an old music box, draped gently over the usual excellently treated field recordings."

download the album for free:

http://www.zymogen.net/releases/zym021/

MICHAEL TROMMER "Tree Line" [2008]

ALBUM

"I tend to listen to this one late at night, as after the first delicately crafted drone, Trommer blends a vast array of exquisitely detailed field recordings into minimalist artistic soundscapes - all of which lures the listener into a mild pre-sleep trance. I rarely listen to it without falling asleep within 10 minutes, but my mind's subconscious looks at the disc with much delight!"

download the album for free:

http://www.serein.co.uk/music/ser018/

LEIF "The Benrhos Dubs" [2008]

E.P

"This is the only piece of House/Tech that is included in this chart...but I thought it deserved a mention, especially as I have been spinning Leif's Trimsound cuts over the last couple of years. Not only that, but I cannot believe that House music as forward-thinking and professional as this could be released as a netlabel E.P!

Netlabel projects are usually ventured for pure non-profit experimentation, making new contacts/friends and to gain feedback. So anyone into proper House should certainly take full advantage, and provide the artist with feedback where it's due.

download the album for free:

http://www.thinner.cc/pages/releases/releases_detail.php?id=thn102

*

So completes the month's list of sounds I've particularly enjoyed. There's been plenty of stuff I've left out mind...but those ten certainly have grabbed my attention for this calendar month. Who knows what the new year will bring!?

MDAC001 Monthly Discerning Audio Chart, 'NOVEMBER 2008'

I decided to broaden the features on this blogspace by adding a monthly list of pieces/albums I've been particularly enjoying over the month. In the past, I've tried writing charts and lists on previous websites/forums and usually tie them to being from one specific genre of music. This didn't work out in the end, as some weeks I'd spend more time listening to tracks of a completely different genre altogether and lose touch with the genre the chart was based on.

So with this monthly 'chat', I am not going to refine the chart by genre and any other rigorous criteria, I'm just going to leave it loose and undefined....

NOVEMBER 2008

(Chart in no particular order)

Ray Valioso - "You'll Never Be Mine"

"Just the way I like my Deep House..."
Parov Stelar - "For All We Know" (From the album 'Rough Cuts')

"Excellent moody downtempo jazz"

Motionfield - "Arcipelago" (From the free netlabel album 'Movements')

"Epic downtempo grooves from a superb album"

Jan Jelinek & Triosk - "Munmorah" (From the album '1+3+1')

"Some of the Deepest laziest music you'll hear"

Marbert Rocel - "The Harder They Come" (From the album 'Speed Emotions')

"Beautifully Melancholy mood piece"
Stafraenn Hakon - "Safi" (From the album '...skettir Edik a ref')

"Smooth Guitar based track"

Tortoise - "Night Air"

"Low slung downtempo"

Markus Guentner - "Soften Edges" (From album Lovely Society)

"Stand out track from a good House album"

The Mercury Program - "The Secret To Quiet"

"Superb Post Rock from a superb band"

Hird - "Burn" (From the album 'Moving On')

"Twisted downtempo funk"

AGCD021 Various Artists "The Main Course" (Audio Gourmet mixed compilation)

CD One, 'The Starter' was the appetiser for this three-course meal. It served as a gentle introductory course to a three-CD series that spans many different flavours and textures.

The 'Main Course' delves much deeper than 'the starter' with its dense textures and subtle ingredients. It is not easy to digest and only the connosieurs will 'get it'. Some of you will find its flavours too unusual a blend that you may never try it again. Yet some will find it unobtrusive, charming and beautiful...coming back for many more helpings in years to come!

http://www.archive.org/details/AudioGourmet-MainCourse23

INGREDIENTS:

001A Audio Gourmet "Misappropriation"

'Suffocated industrial noise sounds'

001B Lum "Redanemone"

'Subtle quirky deepness'

002 Nunc Stans "Land"

'Cinematic atmospheres'

003 Pseudophone "Walkabout"

'Mysterious tribal ambience'

004 Jari Ylamaki "Somnium Est Imago Mortis"

'Minimalist forest funk'

005 Tlon "Farewell"

'Bass-heavy Ambient medley'

006 Off The Sky "Mileece's Reduction"

'Sweet and mellow soundscape'

007 Motionfield "Arcipelago"

'Deep downtempo loops'

008 Roland Fiege & DFO "Exchange"

'Deep hazy minimalism'

009 Anders Ilar "Then It Happens"

'Drones, bass and micro-loops.'

010 Ferenc Vaspoeri "Tibrukila Tree"

'Electronic elevator jam'

011 Osso Bucco "Four Walls"

'Glitchy Folkcore'

012 Zvezdara "Still Life At Sunrise"

'Melancholy electro acoustic finale'

You may have enjoyed that. Room for more? Search for the artists in Google; you'll be amazed at how much more you can find!

AGCD020 AUDIO GOURMET "Subconscious Substance"

At last, Audio Gourmet's third album 'Subconscious Substance' is out on Webbed Hand Records and available for free download.

"This is an album to play when you are sitting alone, reminiscing about bygone times. Subtle, restful melodies and sounds of nature guide the mind to positive, yet nostalgic reveries."

http://www.webbedhandrecords.com/wh112-audio-gourmet-subconscious-substance/

TRACK ORDER:
01 Garden’s Apex (03:52)
02 7 Minutes Of Peace (07:23)
03 October (09:39)
04 Preserving The Obsolete (07:49)
05 Forgotten Dreams (03:30)
06 Subconscious Substance (09:47)
07 25 Years On (07:22)
08 Underlying The Mind (04:59)
09 The Future [Bonus Drone] (12:57)

Recorded and Produced by H. Towell
Cover Photo by B. Towell
Total Time: 01:07:18

"This album is themed around the idea of nostalgia, the subconscious and distant memories; that strange intangible feeling triggered by a familiar stimulus. The brain associates these stimuli with a dormant memory in the brain. Sometimes, these memories can be relived clear as day…others so feint a glimmer that you cannot possibly comprehend what your brain is trying to tell you. This album should hopefully capture the essence of nostalgia, and also serve as a preservation for the sound that I have lifted from every day life."

(1) Garden’s Apex
"Some of the faintest of memories lie in childhood. It will seem a natural process to explore as time presses on and you grow older, yet for children the first experience of this begins within their own back-garden."

(2) 7 Minutes Of Peace
"This track is an effort to preserve and transport the listener to the amazing level of peace I felt as I wandered around Caldey Island, near Tenby, Wales. The piece accurately captures the sheer tranquility and general aura of the island, and shall serve as a vivid nod of nostalgia for as long as I live."

(3) October
"It is October, late Autumn, and winter begins to draw near. The familiar scent of burning wood reminds us of many a year gone by. The leaves have turned, shrivelled and dropped, leaving our trees bare once again as yet another year passes."

(4) Preserving The Obsolete
"A well looked after piano can last over a century, outliving most human beings. It was my usual walk home from lunch, past the auction rooms, where I was to discover the piano. It was left out for the skip, discarded and disused. I decided to come back when nobody was around and see if I could squeeze any last sounds from it before it were to be condemned to the tip forever. I can be unsure of the age of this piano, but try to imagine the lives that it has touched? The people who have played on it? The people listening? Its past owners?"

(5) Forgotten Dreams
"We spend days, months, years sleeping and dreaming. During which, all of our thoughts and past experiences are regurgitate and merged together to create surreal experiences that for just a moment, seem real. Each time we go to bed, for the hours that we spend sleeping, our brain creates a subconscious existence within our mind. Only a fraction of this will be remembered vividly. For the rest of our life, these forgotten dreams can only be faintly relived…just for a split second."

(6) Subconscious Substance
"The subconscious substance - the brain’s basement of memories, events and past experiences, forgotten. We only revisit them for a split second, when a familiar stimulus triggers a sudden moment of unexplained nostalgia."

(7) 25 Years On
"In just a 25 year lifespan, a village, town or city can change considerably. Imagine revisiting somewhere you have not been 25 years on…Old buildings are destroyed, new ones are built. The size of the place can grow, the shops and businesses can change and the whole place will seem rather unfamiliar in comparison to the way you remember it. Yet, in and amongst all this change, a few things remain unchanged and familiar.All of this change is difficult to comprehend, as the memories you hold so fondly seem like yesterday. It is only when you look how you too have changed and what has happened in your life that you will realize the magnitude of time that has elapsed."

(8) Underlying The Mind
"Inside our minds, there are many negative aspects that we are constantly battling with. Doubts, regrets and things we’d have done differently, just eating away at us. An optimist will try to put these niggling pessimistic thoughts to the depths of their subconsciousness. However, regardless, from time to time the thoughts will creep up to the surface of our minds and infect our dreams…"

(9) The Future [BONUS DRONE]
"This track was included on the album at the last minute and is an edited version of a 25 minute piece. This quiet reflective track serves as a window into the boundless and unknown future. It is quite easy as humans with our advanced brains to ponder upon the past, but it is fascinating that the future and what will happen is a complete mystery. Even more mysterious and intangible than nostalgia itself…"

–H. Towell

AGCD019: AUDIO GOURMET "The Starter" (CD 1/3)

This Audio Gourmet blogspace has been used to tracklist/inform on the various CDs we've put together and given away over the last six months or so. We've had mostly Ambient music CDs/mixes, some trip-hop, mellow/cinematic electronica, a couple of bits of House and finally, I've put together the first full-length Downtempo/chillout mix CD.

It will form part of a three-disc mix series showcasing a different range of styles with each mix. The first, 'The Starter' explores the downbeat tempo range with a collage of deep dubby rhythms and funky beats. It will serve as a nice follow up to fans of the previous Plethorama series, yet with one bonus - it has a downloadable mix file!!

http://www.archive.org/details/AudioGourmet-TheStartercd13

TRACKLISTING AS FOLLOWS:
01 RHYTHM & ROOTS "Portland Woodchamber"
02 INNER CITY SOUL "Autostadt"
03 NIKOBELLA "Asleep In Riad"
04 JAZZANOVA "Place In Between"
05 TERRENCE PARKER "Once I Was Lost"
06 KENN STARKS "Fly Away"
07 FLYING LOTUS "Mages Sages"
08 GROOVECATCHER "Cafe De Plage"
09 JASMON "Prince Of Persia"
10 MATT BALZAN "The Agent"
11 RITHMA "Opium Dreams"
12 BLACKFISH "Delta"
13 FOREIGN TERRAIN "Hessia"
14 MAXIMILIAN LOOP "Close To The Edge"

The very most important thing I hope that you get from this CD is enjoyment of course and hopefully gain enthusiasm for this type of music. The artists are the real talent, not me! I may have spent a long time searching for/discovering this music, but the artists are the ones who have produced the material and I hope that people will use this mix series as a spring-board in discovering/searching into the artists themselves. So...all that waffling basically means:

SUPPORT THE ARTISTS AND THEIR RESPECTIVE LABELS!!!!!

AGCD018 "TRANSIENT UNIVERSE" An Audio Gourmet Mix

"Transient Universe - Everyone has off days...have we ever wondered WHY?"

Download/Stream: http://www.stillaudio.com/2008/08/still-audio-26-transient-universe

Transient Universe refers to the universe not being fixed, as most imagine. It is the idea that the universe is constantly expanding and contracting at a varying rate. With this, the theory has it that our moods and emotions change in accordance with these contractions.
Everybody will remember times when they felt they had more energy, more confidence and optimism in a particular situation...and equally they will remember the times when they just haven't felt up to it. Often, these feelings are unexplainable, as there is not necessarily a reason for us being suddenly optimistic/pessimistic.
Think of a human striving for a dream or goal and whilst usually remaining confident, the next day they wake up feeling they're just not good enough to make the grade.
The Transient Universe theory explains that this sporadic fluctuation in mood is a completely natural process...

So, with this theory in mind and being a popular topic of discussion amongst my friends, I've decided to put together a mix to capture the essence of our ideas.
This quiet, half-hour Ambient mix wavers gently and smoothly between differing Ambient moods, encapsulating the theory that our mood can shift along with the expanding and contracting of the universe.

To make the mix, I downloaded a copy of Acoustica mp3 Mixer and began selecting a few tracks, some metal clangs, thunder samples, rain recordings and other field recordings to create this audio collage.

A special thanks goes out to Peter Goddard for supplying the coverart image; as soon as I stumbled accross it on Facebook I knew it would be suitable for a project at some point...this one seems to fit nicely - thanks!

Another thankyou - I'd like to commend Simon at www.stillaudio.com for featuring this mix as a podcast on the Still Audio site. It's an excellent place for keepingin touch with a wide range of electronic music styles, from netlabels around the world. Thanks again Simon!

The tracklisting, which follows, cannot be fully accurate, as in most areas of the mix there are subtle field-recording underscores...The tracks are in the right order, at least.

KEVIN KREBS - "The Blue Concubine & I" [Audio Gourmet Short Edit]
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]
MOTIONFIELD - "Sounds From A Lonely Forest"
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]
KENNETH KIRSCHNER - "25th of January, 1997"
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]
MORTESIUM - "Dream State"
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]
AUDIO GOURMET - "Untitled Drone #1"
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]
THE GREEN KINGDOM - "Epic Toadlick"
POCKA - "Dao"
CON CETTA - "2.53"
[Audio Gourmet field recordings]