Thursday 25 August 2022

Square Sun (D. Trevarthen) / Royal Flush - Split Tape -1989- (Cassette, The Head Corporation/Black Death), Scotland/Netherlands

Here's an odd but great one. It took me some time to decipher this cassette since the cover kind of confused me at first. In any case it seems to be a split tape between Scottish home-taper Dion Trevarthen (also known as Square Sun) and Royal Flush, a home-taping act that was released by the Black Death tape label from the small town of Zoetermeer, The Netherlands. Black Death was created by Marcel Tuijenburg. A label which a.o. published compilations of the international home-taping community. The music on this cassette by Royal Flush seems to have been a solo effort by B. du Perron who creates a long dark ambient soundscape.

The other side of the tape consists of some dazzling hypnotic acid drenched electronic music by Dion Trevarthen. Hailing from the village of Aberlady, East Lothian, Trevarthen was part of a psychedelic space-rock group called Sponge along with his two brothers. He also released his own electronic music under the name Square Sun on various international tape labels. One of the most notable releases was the Tierversuche, Das Perfekte Konzept Der Selbstvernichtung tape on the German cassette label IRRE.

Fluorescent Tube Shadows is a mind-bending psychedelic piece of electronic home-taping music. There are many electronic textures, radio waves, rhythms and strange transitions going on. I recommend hearing this loud on some serious speakers and not just some screenspeakers. It has a very immersive deep sound that almost absorbs you. Within home-recordings it illustrates the transition of the 80's minimal synth sound into some of the new electronic music of the 90's, but somehow remains ungraspable. Some other acts that might be alike are Ras.Al.Ghul from Portugal or Delta-Sleep-Inducing Peptide from Germany. Or or or.

It would be great if some label would reissue some Square Sun music, but I guess it's wishful thinking.

Get Fluorescent Tube Shadows HERE

Kindly donated by the Y Create Archive

Tuesday 2 August 2022

Various Artists - Warmth And Silence -1988- (Cassette, Epitapes), US/International

 

Here we have yet another compilation on Epitapes that was established by Mike Tetrault from Belchertown, Massachusetts. Throughout the 80's dozens of these compilations were created. Each compilation was based around a certain theme and assembled accordingly by Mike Tetrault. Some of the tracks were taken from existing releases while others were sent specially for these tapes. You can read an interesting interview about these cassette series with Mike Tetrault over here.

The title of this cassette "Warmth And Silence" already reveals the type of music that was selected for this compilation: subtle ambient experimental sounds for more than one hour and a half created by a large range of home-taping projects from around the globe. Present on here are quite a few more known cassette culture protagonists like Illusion Of Safety (Dan Burke, US), Hessel Veldman (Holland), DZ Lectric (France),  Hands To (Jeph Jarman, US) and Los Paranos (Christophe Petchanatz, France). 

A curiosity on this compilation is that Mike Tetrault also features a piece by himself in which delicate rhythms create a base for a whispered reading of André Breton's surrealist poem "Freedom Of Love".

Get it HERE

Kindly donated by the Y Create Archive