Vive l’amitié!

September 12th, 2011 § 1 comment § permalink

As the wind howls around us here and the slates rattle ominously over the backdrop of a record I’m realising I first heard and loved more than 25 years ago—certain parts of which still make my spine tingle with happiness—one thing strikes me: there’s nothing as life-affirming as finally meeting people you’ve known previously only through the grace of that magical flow of electrons and signals that stitch together this rapidly-shrinking planet.

There will be no miracles here...

I’ve spent a reasonable proportion of the last week or so in the company of the wonderful Nancy Novotny and Hk Kahng, two of the warmest, most genuine, most literate friends I’ve yet had the pleasure to encounter. We’ve wandered along some interesting byways, all the while talking about music and books, cats and the esoteric, art and games and technology, as well as many other shared interests. It might be the single malt talking, or just the sadness of their leaving Edinburgh today, but I rarely make personal posts on this site and needed to record that I’ll miss them and hope we’ll meet again properly soon.

Empty Transmissions

August 19th, 2011 § 0 comments § permalink

My great friend Andrew Paine is releasing a new tape of mine Empty Transmissions as part of his ever-eclectic Sonic Oyster roster. It will be released on 29 August.

You can listen to a short excerpt of the A side (Corridor of Stars) here:
Brian Lavelle – Corridor of Stars (excerpt) by Sonic Oyster Records

There are just 50 copies of this, in wraparound paper sleeves, and I’m told that there are only 8 or so of these left from the label. You can pre-order it here. I will have a few myself in due course but if you’re interested I’d get in touch with Mr Paine soon.

Empty Transmissions is – nominally, at least – the first part of a continuing space opera project entitled Binary Light. Stay tuned for the next instalment…

Suburban Electrification – preorder

June 24th, 2011 § 0 comments § permalink

Almost here—just on the horizon—is a very special album to be released on cassette by that most eclectic of labels out of Kansas City, Overland Shark, run by the inspired and inspiring Andrew Heuback.

Entitled Suburban Electrification, this is quite an unusual album for me: 13 short synthesizer ‘miniatures’ that occupy relatively unusual territory in comparison to what’s gone before.

Suburban Electrification

The album was put together with the notion of restricted instrumentation (i.e. one synthesizer) and short duration in mind: the challenge was to create pieces that convey the same emotional impact as my longform works. I don’t know if I succeeded, but it was fun creating the music on this album and it’s informed quite a bit of what I’ve recorded in the four or five months since I finished it.

The album will be released mid- to late-July 2011. You can preorder it here in both digital and cassette tape formats, although if you order the tape, you’ll also get a high quality download of the album in your choice of 320k mp3, FLAC or other digital formats. It can also be streamed in its entirety from that page.

OMG Vinyl had this to say:

In case we haven’t convinced you yet, let us say it again, Kansas’ Overland Shark is easily one of the best tape labels in existence. They’ve got two new releases up, both amazing and incredibly different from one another. Brian Lavelle’s “Suburban Electrification” is a near-perfect collection of short, precise synthesizer jams (quite different from his usual multi-instrumental, side-long movements). The genre conventions of drone and ambient are left behind, revealing fields of minimal electronic music ripe for cultivation. This one is fucking tops.

Following this album are two other releases on cassette: Amulets, on Digitalis; and Empty Transmissions, on Sonic Oyster Cassettes. 2011 is the year of the tape, it seems…