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ARTHUR RUSSELL

Arthur Russell

Open Vocal Phrases....

'Open Vocal Phrases, Where Songs Come In and Out' offers an intimate unedited solo live performance recorded at Phill Niblock's Experimental Intermedia Foundation in Downtown NYC on 12/20/85.

Phill curated and produced with Arthur two concerts at EI that would become an integral part of the foundation for the final World of Echo album. Arthur titled this performance 'Open Vocal Phrases, Where Songs Come In and Out'. This extraordinary performance was recorded by Steve Cellum and overseen by Phill and Arthur. Arthur would later edit sections from this performance merging it with studio material recorded at Battery Sound to finalize the 'World of Echo' album released in 1986.

"Some of it sounds so pure and clear and I am picturing him huddled around all that gear, simply magical. In my memory he didn't play "for" the audience but was rather trying to perfect these various permutations of sound within himself...and a few of us just happened to be present" - Tom Lee

TRACK LISTING

LP Tracklist:
1. That’s The Very Reason
2. Tower Of Meaning/Rabbit’s Ear/Home Away From Home
3. Happy Ending
4. All-Boy All-Girl/Tiger Stripes/You Can’t Hold Me Down
5. Introductions
6. Hiding Your Present From You/School Bell
7. Too Early To Tell
8. Changing Forest
9. Sunlit Water

CD Tracklist:
CD1 - Sketches For World Of Echo:
1. Changing Forest
2. Let’s Go Swimming
3. They And Their Friends
4. Keeping Up
5. Make 1,2
6. I Take This Time
7. Losing My Taste For The Nightlife
8. I Can’t Hide You
9. The Boy With A Smile On His Face
10. Sunlit Water

CD2 - Open Vocal Phrases Where Songs Come In And Out:
1. That’s The Very Reason
2. Tower Of Meaning/Rabbit’s Ear/Home Away From Home
3. Happy Ending
4. All-Boy All-Girl/Tiger Stripes/You Can’t Hold Me Down
5. Introductions
6. Hiding Your Present From You/School Bell
7. Too Early To Tell

Peter Broderick & Ensemble 0

Give It To The Sky: Arthur Russell’s Tower Of Meaning Expanded

This autumn, Erased Tapes are set to release ‘Give It to the Sky: Arthur Russell’s Tower of Meaning Expanded’ by composer and producer Peter Broderick and French 12-piece group Ensemble 0; a complete re-recording of Russell’s epic minimalist orchestral composition originally released in 1983. Released 6th October, ‘Give It to the Sky’ also includes unreleased tracks by Russell which have been restored and re-recorded, resulting in an 80-minute reanimation that threads several lost songs into a meticulous and gorgeous rendering.

Ensemble 0 weave in and out of Broderick’s additions. ‘Corky’, a poignant cowboy ballad that Russell never finished, appears, disappears, and reappears three times, the droning exhalations of ‘Tower of Meaning’ making it feel sweeter and sadder. Arriving just after the triumphant halfway mark, the title track is a sublime meditation on mere existence, about staring at some simple rural scene and marcelling at the miracle of being anywhere at all. It is an apt encapsulation of how this entire project feels – a glorious way to hear something that might have seemed familiar as if for the very first time.

Russell was never much for definitive versions, of course. He was constantly rethinking the possibilities of a piece, of wondering what else it could do. ‘Give it to the Sky’ is a powerful affirmation of those principles, using Tower of Meaning’s framework to build outward and upward, to shape something that functions within Russell’s wondrous, paradoxical world. And ‘Give it to the Sky’ is also not intended to be some definitive last word. Broderick and Ensemble 0 speak already of the ways it may shift on stage, of where else it might lead.

TRACK LISTING

A1.Tower Of Meaning I
A2. Tower Of Meaning II
A3. Tower Of Meaning III
A4. Tower Of Meaning IV
A5. Corky I / White Jet Set Smoke Trail I
A6. Consideration
B1. Tower Of Meaning V
B2. Tower Of Meaning VI
B3. Tower Of Meaning VII
B4. Tower Of Meaning VIII
B5. Tower Of Meaning IX / Corky II
C1. Tower Of Meaning X
C2. Give It To The Sky
D1. Tower Of Meaning XI
D2. Tower Of Meaning XII
D3. Corky III
D4. White Jet Smoke Trail II

Arthur Russell

Picture Of Bunny Rabbit

Rough Trade Records in partnership with Audika Records are excited to announce ‘Picture of Bunny Rabbit’ a new album of previously unreleased World Of Echo era material by Arthur Russell recorded in 1985/86.

‘Picture of Bunny Rabbit’ features nine previously unreleased performances from this era compiled from completed masters culled from two unique test pressings, including one, dated 9/15/85 by Arthur, provided by his mother and sister. A further four tracks were discovered in his tape archive. The track listing includes an exceptional and dramatic solo recording of “In The Light of a Miracle” and the enigmatic title instrumental “Picture of Bunny Rabbit”, written especially for a friends pet rabbit. The bulk of the material was recorded with engineer Eric Liljestrand at Battery Sound Studios, New York, which was located directly opposite the World Trade Center and at Arthur’s apartment studio in the East Village.

In 1986 Arthur Russell was diagnosed with HIV, that same year he released his career-defining masterpiece ‘World of Echo’, the first and only solo album issued during his lifetime. Arthur had found his voice and a fresh direction with a set of new, transformative material, unlike anything he or anyone else had previously released. His illness ensured that the artistic growth and sense of exploration encapsulated in ‘World of Echo’ would be tragically curtailed. Within six short years Arthur was gone.

Arthur’s final years were filled with a renewed commitment to creativity and unceasing live and recording work. He regularly performed the ‘World of Echo’ material and incorporated several of its compositions in collaborations with choreographers active in New York’s innovative dance community. Arthur worked closely with Diane Madden, Allison Salzinger, Stephanie Woodard and John Bernd, usually playing his cello and effects boxes off stage as the choreographers’ pieces were performed. In 1993 Arthur posthumously received a prestigious Bessie Composer Award for his work in the dance world.

This release is the latest in a series in partnership with Audika Records, the exclusive label and home for the Arthur Russell archive and estate, who since 2004 have compiled and published the exceptionally varied, long sought-after music of Arthur Russell, and who in the process have helped the beloved, late artist find the broader audience he always believed he would reach. A new generation of listeners and critics has come to appreciate Russell as a visionary and an influence upon a broad range of today’s most compelling musical artists.

STAFF COMMENTS

Barry says: Some premium unearthed material here from the late, great Arthur Russell. Having come from the World Of Echo sessions, you know that there's some superb material here, including nine previously unreleased performances including some salvaged from tape provided by his mother and sister.

TRACK LISTING

Side A:
Fuzzbuster 10
Not Checking Up
Telling No One
Fuzzbuster 06
The Boy With A Smile
Side B:
Fuzzbuster 09
Very Reason
Picture Of Bunny Rabbit
In The Light Of A Miracle

Arthur Russell

Love Is Overtaking Me - 2022 Reissue

‘Love Is Overtaking Me’, originally released in 2008 comprises 21 demos and home recordings of unreleased pop, folk and country songs from Arthur’s vast catalogue. While much critical and popular affection for Russell’s music has come about well after his untimely death from AIDS in 1992, many fellow artists believed in his genius and were drawn to collaborate with him during his lifetime. The legendary producer John Hammond (Billie Holiday, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen) recorded Russell on several occasions; a number of these recordings can be heard on ‘Love Is Overtaking Me’. Alongside songs recorded with various incarnations of The Flying Hearts, a group formed by Russell with Ernie Brooks whose shifting line up included, by turns, Jerry Harrison, Rhys Chatham, Jon Gibson, Peter Gordon and Peter Zummo as well as Larry Saltzman and David Van Tieghem. Several other Russell projects are represented on Love Is Overtaking Me, including The Sailboats, Turbo Sporty and Bright & Early.

Compiled from over eight hours of material, ‘Love Is Overtaking Me’ reaches back further to Russell’s first compositions from the early `70s and spans forward to his very last recordings, made at home in 1991. Chris Taylor of Grizzly Bear contributed mixing, restoration and editing to the album, whose tracks were selected by Audika’s Steve Knutson, Ernie Brooks and Russell’s companion, Tom Lee. Several songs feature prominently in Matt Wolf’s film ‘Wild Combination: A Portrait of Arthur Russell’.

Extensive ‘Love Is Overtaking Me’ liner notes by Tom Lee provide an intimate perspective on Russell’s diverse catalogue, which spanned an extraordinary diversity of styles and won the love of artistic communities that would seem utterly disparate, from Philip Glass, John Cage and Allen Ginsberg to rock bands like The Talking Heads and The Modern Lovers; the pre-Studio 54 disco-party scene of Nicky Siano’s Gallery and David Mancuso’s Loft; and DJ-producers like Francois Kevorkian and Larry Levan, among others.

TRACK LISTING

Side A
Close My Eyes
Goodbye Old Paint
Maybe She
Oh Fernanda Why
Time Away
Nobody Wants A Lonely Heart

Side B
I Couldn't Say It To Your Face
This Time Dad You're Wrong
What It's Like
Eli
Hey! How Does Everybody Know

Side C
I Forget And I Can't Tell (Ballad Of The Lights Pt. 1)
Habit Of You
Janine
Big Moon
Your Motion Says
The Letter

Side D
Don't Forget About Me
Love Is Overtaking Me
Planted A Thought
Love Comes Back

Arthur Russell

Corn - 2022 Reissue

Corn, originally released in 2015, features nine tracks Russell recorded in 1982 and 1983. In collaboration with Russell’s partner Tom Lee, Audika’s Steve Knutson compiled Corn from Arthur’s original, completed 1/4” tape masters. Russell himself compiled this material on three separate test pressings—labelled El Dinosaur, Indian Ocean, and Untitled, respectively— in 1985.

Russell fans know something of the Corn sound from Audika’s debut release, ‘Calling Out of Context’ (2004), which included four songs from these sessions: ‘The Deer In The Forest Part 1,’ ‘The Platform on the Ocean,’ ‘Calling Out Of Context,’ and ‘I Like You!’

This new collection includes rhythmic alternate versions of ‘Lucky Cloud,’ ‘Keeping Up,’ ‘See My Brother, He’s Jumping Out (Let’s Go Swimming #2),’ ‘This Is How We Walk on the Moon,’ and ‘Hiding Your Present From You,’ along with ‘Corn,’ ‘Corn (Continued),’ ‘They and Their Friends,’ and the closing instrumental ‘Ocean Movie,’ one of the most beautiful and curious Russell tracks ever to see the light of day.

TRACK LISTING

Lucky Cloud
Corn
Keeping Up
See My Brother, He's Jumping Out (Let's Go Swimming #2)
This Is How We Walk On The Moon
Corn (Continued)
Hiding Your Present From You
They And Their Friends
Ocean Movie

Arthur Russell

Instrumentals - 2022 Remastered Edition

Remastered double LP with 12 page booklet including liner notes by Tim Lawrence, Ernie Brooks and Arthur Russell.

Before Disco, and before the transcendent echoes, Arthur studied to be a composer.

His journey began in 1972, running away from his home in Oskaloosa, Iowa.

Heading west to Northern California, Arthur studied Indian classical composition at the Ali Akbar Khan College of Music followed by western orchestral music at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, before ending two years later in New York at the Manhattan School of Music.

Traversing the popular and the serious, Arthur composed “Instrumentals” in 1974, inspired by the photography of his Buddhist teacher, Yuko Nonomura, as Arthur described, “I was awakened, or re-awakened to the bright-sound and magical qualities of the bubblegum and easy-listening currents in American popular music”.

Initially intended to be performed in one 48 hour cycle, “Instrumentals” was in fact only performed a handful of times as a work in progress.

The legendary performances captured live in New York at The Kitchen (1975 and 1978) and Franklin St. Arts Center (1977) feature the cream of that eras downtown new music scene including Ernie Brooks, Rhys Chatham, Julius Eastman, Jon Gibson, Peter Gordon, Garrett List, Andy Paley, Bill Ruyle, Dave Van Tieghem, and Peter Zummo.

Pitchfork lauded “Instrumentals” Vol. 1 as a masterpiece and one of Arthur’s “greatest achievements”. Americana touching on Copeland, Ives, and maybe even Brian Wilson. “Instrumentals” Vol. 2 is a moving, deeply pastoral work performed by the CETA Orchestra and conducted by Julius Eastman. Also included are two of Arthur’s most elusive compositions, Reach One, and Sketch For “Face Of Helen”. Recorded live in 1975 at Phill Niblock’s Experimental Intermedia Foundation, Reach One is a minimal, hypnotic ambient soundscape written and performed for two Fender Rhodes pianos. Sketch For “Face Of Helen” was inspired by Arthur’s work with friend and composer Arnold Dreyblatt, recorded with an electronic tone generator, keyboard and ambient recordings of a rumbling tugboat from the Hudson River.

TRACK LISTING

"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 1
"Instrumentals" Volume 2
"Instrumentals" Volume 2
"Instrumentals" Volume 2
"Instrumentals" Volume 2
"Instrumentals" Volume 2
Sketch For The Face Of Helen
Reach One

Originally released on LP in 1986, “World Of Echo” is a deeply intimate and meditative work of awe-inspiring grace and remains a timeless work of sublime beauty. Arthur’s aim was to achieve what he calls 'the most vivid rhythmic reality', with just cello, voice, and echoes. Arthur achieved all of this and more on one of the most amazing albums you will ever hear.

Often listed in the various 'most important albums you'll ever hear' type of fair; its innovative and maverick approach to the whole production process (even famously recording the album on a full moon) would go on to inspire countless future generations of creatives; especially across lo-fi and DIY scenes. His mix of classical training, frankly punk attitude and love of experimentation forged a sound that was unequivocally his own; a rare and epochal force of nature that will never be copied again.

If you don't own a copy of this album, I urge you to reconsider! It's a must-have for any serious music lover. Copies always fly out too, so take advantage now as when its out of press it always commands big bucks.






TRACK LISTING

Tone Bone Kone 0:57
Soon-To-Be Innocent Fun / Let's See 9:19
Answers Me 2:04
Being It 5:23
Place I Know / Kid Like You 3:20
She's The Star / I Take This Time 4:46
Tree House 2:09
See-Through 2:08
Hiding Your Present From You 4:06
Wax The Van 2:05
All-Boy All-Girl 3:34
Lucky Cloud 2:46
Tower Of Meaning / Rabbit's Ear / Home Away From Home 4:20
Let's Go Swimming

At once kaleidoscopic and intimate, "Iowa Dream" bears some of Russell’s most personal work, including several recently discovered folk songs he wrote during his time in Northern California in the early 1970s. For Russell, Iowa was never very far away. “I see, I see it all,” sings Russell on the title track: red houses, fields, the town mayor (his father) streaming by as he dream-bicycles through his hometown. Russell’s childhood home and family echo, too, through “Just Regular People,” “I Wish I Had a Brother,” “Wonder Boy,” “The Dogs Outside are Barking,” “Sharper Eyes,” and “I Felt.” Meanwhile, songs like “I Kissed the Girl From Outer Space,” “I Still Love You,” “List of Boys,” and “Barefoot in New York” fizz with pop and dance grooves, gesturing at Russell’s devotion to New York’s avant-garde and disco scenes. Finally, the long-awaited “You Did it Yourself,” until now heard only in a brief heart-stopping black-and-white clip in Matt Wolf’s documentary Wild Combination, awards us a new take with a driving funk rhythm and Russell’s extraordinary voice soaring at the height of its powers. On "Iowa Dream", you can hear a country kid meeting the rest of the world - and with this record, the world continues to meet a totally singular artist.




TRACK LISTING

Side 1
1. Wonder Boy
2. I Never Get Lonesome
3. Everybody Everybody
4. You Did It Yourself
5. Come To Life
6. Iowa Dream
7. Words Of Love
8. I Still Love You
9. You Are My Love
10. Barefoot In New York
11. Just Regular People
12. I Wish I Had A Brother
13. I Felt
14. The Dogs Outside Are Barking
15. Sharper Eyes
16. Follow You
17. List Of Boys
18. I Kissed The Girl From Outer Space
19. In Love With You For The Last Time

Tim Lawrence

Hold On To Your Dreams : Arthur Russell And The Downtown Music Scene, 1973-1992

Hold On to Your Dreams is the first biography of the musician and composer Arthur Russell, one of the most important but least known contributors to New York's downtown music scene during the 1970s and 1980s. With the exception of a few dance recordings, including "Is It All Over My Face?" and "Go Bang! #5", Russell's pioneering music was largely forgotten until 2004, when the posthumous release of two albums brought new attention to the artist. This revival of interest gained momentum with the issue of additional albums and the documentary film Wild Combination.

Based on interviews with more than seventy of his collaborators, family members, and friends, Hold On to Your Dreams provides vital new information about this singular, eccentric musician and his role in the boundary-breaking downtown music scene. Tim Lawrence traces Russell's odyssey from his hometown of Oskaloosa, Iowa, to countercultural San Francisco, and eventually to New York, where he lived from 1973 until his death from AIDS-related complications in 1992. Resisting definition while dreaming of commercial success, Russell wrote and performed new wave and disco as well as quirky rock, twisted folk, voice-cello dub, and hip-hop-inflected pop.

"He was way ahead of other people in understanding that the walls between concert music and popular music and avant-garde music were illusory," comments the composer Philip Glass. "He lived in a world in which those walls weren't there." Lawrence follows Russell across musical genres and through such vital downtown music spaces as the Kitchen, the Loft, the Gallery, the Paradise Garage, and the Experimental Intermedia Foundation. Along the way, he captures Russell's openness to sound, his commitment to collaboration, and his uncompromising idealism.

This new edition of Soul Jazz Records’ ‘The World Of Arthur Russell’, the seminal collection of Arthur Russell’s essential music, is released on heavy deluxe triple vinyl and deluxe tip-on Japanese style CD edition.
This album brings together some of Russell’s best-loved and most accessible works including his wide-ranging music, both solo and in groups, including Dinosaur L (the essential ‘Go Bang’), Loose Joints (the equally classic ‘Is It All Over My Face’) as well as rarities such as the 7” only ‘Pop Your Funk’, Indian Ocean’s ‘Schoolbell / Treehouse’, Lola’s ‘Wax The Van’ and more.

Arthur Russell’s music effortlessly crossed musical boundaries making it timeless. His dance music credentials are faultless and this collection features mixes from Larry Levan, Françcois Kevorkian and Walter Gibbons. Similarly, his songwriting, musicality and performance skills are equally cherished, as composer Philip Glass wrote, “this was a guy who could sit down with a cello and sing with it in a way that no one on earth has ever done before or will do again.”

When Soul Jazz Records’ ‘The World Of Arthur Russell’ first came out in 2003, Russell’s music had slipped into near obscurity. Nearly 15 years later there are over a dozen releases of his music, reissues of his original albums and more. ‘The World Of Arthur Russell’ is the classic first collection of his work available once more.


TRACK LISTING

Dinosaur L - Go Bang (Francois Kevorkian Mix)
Lola - Wax The Van
Loose Joints - Is It All Over My Face (Larry Levan Mix)
Arthur Russell - Keeping Up
Arthur Russell - In The Light Of The Miracle
Arthur Russell - A Little Lost
Loose Joints - Pop Your Funk
Arthur Russell - Let's Go Swimming (Walter Gibbons Mix)
Dinosaur L - In The Cornbelt (Larry Levan Mix)
Arthur Russell - Treehouse
Indian Ocean - Schoolbell/Treehouse (Walter Gibbons Mix)

Arthur Russell

Calling Out Of Context

During a short, prolific, and often misunderstood career, Arthur Russell bridged the boundaries between downtown New York's vital rock, avant-garde and post-disco scenes of the '70s and '80s. More than a decade after his death from AIDS at age 41, the full breadth and influence of Russell's work will finally reveal itself with various reissues and collections. Following on from Soul Jazz's "The World Of Arthur Russell", "Calling Out of Context" is a collection of his final, unreleased recordings, including a 1985 LP "Corn" and an abandoned LP recorded for Rough Trade between 1986 - 1990. Mixing funky, avant garde rhythms with pop melodies Russell created some of the most beautiful, off kilter tracks from that time.

TRACK LISTING

The Deer In The Forest Part One 1:35
The Platform On The Ocean 8:05
You And Me Both 3:45
Calling Out Of Context 5:46
Arm Around You 6:32
That's Us / Wild Combination 6:58
Make 1, 2 2:50
Hop On Down 6:03
Get Around To It 4:59
I Like You! 5:01
You Can Make Me Feel Bad 1:29
Calling All Kids (Walter Gibbons Remix) 7:16


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