Lau Nau
Nukkuu
Locust 111 CD / LP

Nukkuu (Finnish for Sleeps) is the long awaited sophomore album by celebrated Finnish  folk fave Lau Nau. Nukkuu is psychedelic, abstract & emotionally captivating. Nukkuu is an album of changes.

In the years since her debut album Kuutarha, Laura became a mother, moved to the Finnish countryside and took valuable time to carve out a space for her enchanted art in the new found tranquility of her remote surroundings.

Conceived in tight attics & vacant dens on off hours when her young son Nuutti was fast asleep, this is an intimately crafted 9 song collection that unfolds like dreamlike musical ribbons for the senses and delivers the listener to a place of unhurried contentedness.

check out "Painovoimaa, valoa", Other Music's  download of the week,  here. 

 
Nalle
The Sirens Wave
Locust 109 CD / LP

Imagine for a moment the Wicker Man manned by the late Teiji Ito - resident avant composer for Harry Smith & Maya Derren - with psych folk giants Comus sitting in for good measure and you've got some idea of what Glasgow avant folk trio Nalle have put together on their mesmerizing sophomore effort The Sirens Wave. Centred around Hanna Tuulikki's rich and expansive vocals, with a heady, kaleidoscopic mix of vintage whirling
oscillators, Moog synth and buzzing harmonium, alongside the intrepid string explorations of Chris Hladowski and Aby Vulliamy, these six pieces continue the long trek through other worlds of sound to form a dense, cohesive suite that meshes everything from Japanese Gagaku, European plainsong, Near Eastern modal drones and more. With Siren's Wave, Nalle have procured a special place where folk conventions are curiously
uprooted & seamlessly meshed with other worldly avant tendencies. Features members of The Family Elan, Scatter & the One Ensemble of Daniel Padden. 

Richard Bishop
God Damn Religion
Locust 107 DVD / Limited bonus CD

Official DVD release of Sir Richard Bishop’s cracked movie God Damn Religion. First edition comes with a bonus audio CD of the quasi soundtrack Elektronika Demonika, originally issued by Locust as a vinyl-only escapade in 2006.

“For centuries, man has used organized religion to control the hearts and minds (not to mention the pocketbooks) of the ignorant masses. Well, Richard Bishop has decided he would like a piece of the action.

This film is a diabolical experiment in hypnotic mind control—a phantasmagoric presentation of demonic and divine imagery, meticulously assembled and designed to put the viewer into an altered state of darkened awareness. Includes original music from Elektronika Demonika, as well as unreleased material.

If you ever wanted to go to hell and back, this film will get you halfway there. Some viewers may find the imagery used in this film to be disturbing, but that’s the idea. Contains some strong sexual content (as all true religion should). Not for the weak-minded, faint of heart, or those suffering from occasional seizures.” 

Hello, Blue Roses
The Portrait Is Finished & I have Failed To Capture Your Beauty
locust 106

The sweetheart duo of Dan Bejar (Destroyer) & Sydney Vermont (visual artist, former Toronto Children’s Choir kid singer) have tied the knot around an infectious readymade classic with their 14 track self titled debut. The Portait Is Finished folds the last few decades of pop music together, drawing on everything from an unabashed love of 80s AOR (Prefab Sprout) to the cheery mysticism of young Scotland ( Orange Juice & Felt) to prime Aquarian age femme folk of the 60s & 70s (Bridget St. John, et. al.).

Dominique Grimaud
Les Quatre Directions
locust 105 CD

Dominique Grimaud is a hidden treasure of France's psych,  free rock, electronic & jazz improv scenes. As a founding member of the legendary psych act Camizole (1970 - 1978) to his equally inspired new wave duo Video-Aventures (1978-) whose groundbreaking music has been viewed as a precursor to the sound of Stereolab to his jaw dropping audio visual performance installations & live performances with celebrated performer Colleen, Grimaud has spent his entire life  exploring the musical fringes of the French underground.

With  Les Quatre Directions, Grimaud reemerges with his first release in nearly a decade and it's an electroacoustic  whirlwind that hearkens back to the expanded audio visoneering & spiritualism of 60s electronic music luminaries.

GazHeart
GazHeart
locust94

With GazHeart, celebrated visual artist Rita Ackermann (voice) & the No Neck Blues Band’s Dave Nuss (found percussion) created a playful spontaneous sound that seemingly bridged the gap between the broken pop sounds of certain strains of the no wave movement, sound poetry and catchy, otherworldly art folk using the barest of resources available to them. The one sided self titled album is available in a one time public edition of 400 copies and features a playful etching on one side by Ackermann housed in a plain white jacket with two offset printed drawings on brilliant white archival paper. 

“The GazHeart recordings were made in August of 2004 after the disintegration of Angelblood at ATP in April. Rita and I traveled every August to Budapest to be with her family, who live in the hills outside the city in a small German village called Budaörs, created after WWII. The mise-en-scene of our life there was total village simplicity – grandma’s cooking, dogs running the streets, babies with leaky diapers on big wheels, and gypsies hanging out in bars. We would go every Sunday morning to the gypsy market where the vendors would spread out a bunch of garbage on blankets in a parking lot, all the proprietors drunk by 10am on wine consumed from coke bottles. At the time of recording Rita had adopted the surrealist idea of automatic, unmediated writing direct from the unconscious, using spontaneous text to create songlike atmospheres, in the spirit of Tristan Tzara. For the percussion, I wound up keeping it simple and true to the environs: a bucket, a glass jar, a coffee can & a straw broom. All recordings were made to magnetic tape in the back yard late at night after the village was sleeping.” - Dave Nuss

Eric Carbonara
Exodus Bulldornadius
locust 104 / Wooden Guitar CD

Exodus Bulldornadius is Philly multi-instrumentalist Eric Carbonara's contribution to Locust Music's ongoing Wooden Guitar series. Carbonara's playing draws on the rich musical styles from Andalusian Roma-Flamenco to Hindustani & North African folk to form a kind of exalted pidgin style of playing that covers a wide emotional terrain from meditative calm to restless unease