Various Artists : Nihon Kizuna

Featuring Kode 9, Kuedo, Rudi Zygadlo, Broken Haze, Circulations Records, All City Records, Daisuke Tanabe, Yosi Horikawa, XLII, Memory 9, Ninja Tune, Kid Kanevil, Om Unit, Paul White, One Handed Music, BD1982, Illum Sphere, Fink, Emika, Mux Mool, Ernest Gonzales, Paper Tiger, Sesped, Jay Scarlett, Elliott Yorke (Royalty), Kan Sano, Onra and many more.

Over 40 international artists have donated music for the Nihon Kizuna compilation in aid of the Japan disaster relief effort. Nihon Kizuna, or 日本絆 in Japanese roughly translates as ‘bond of friendship with Japan’.

Following the earthquake and tsunami which devastated the northern coast and prefectures of Japan on Friday March 11th 2011, a small group of Tokyo-based artists (from Japan, Ukraine and France) and one visiting London-based journalist (from Italy) decided to pull their efforts and contacts together to do the only thing they could to help the country and its people – sell music to raise awareness of the devastation that hit the area and raise money for its people and the relief effort.

The motivation behind Nihon Kizuna was simple: in face of the feeling of helplessness many felt here in Japan in the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami this compilation seemed like the best way to express our support and love for the country and its people. Amid widespread scaremongering and panic from the foreign media it felt only right to stand tall alongside the people of Japan who have always welcomed foreign artists and musicians with open arms and hearts.

The compilation was put together in five days thanks to the internet. Every artist and/or label on the compilation donated a track, either previously released, unreleased or created especially for the occasion. Many of the tracks, artists and labels on the compilation have a direct relation to Japan, further highlighting the connection many people outside of the country feel towards Japan in the current situation. It’s no small thing to say that many of those involved feel a kinship to the country regardless of whether or not they’ve ever lived in or visited the country.

Buy at nihonkizuna.bandcamp.com. All proceeds from the compilation will be given to the Japan Red Cross directly.



More at nihonkizuna.com.

Phoenix : Kitsuné Tabloid

Its been out for a few weeks but this CD has become a Saturday morning regular in the Proper Songs household. Lovingly selected by Phoenix, the majority of the tracks are pulled from the 60's and 70's - Roxy Music, Dennis Wilson, The 13th Floor Elevators, The Impressions - with the only truly contemporary choice coming from Dirty Projectors' album of 2007. It is obvious that Phoenix gave this unmixed compilation a great deal of attention, with the result in giving it the air of a mixtape thoughtfully created by a close friend.

Buy at Amazon.

Benge : Twenty Systems

'Twenty Systems' by Benge is a fascinating release by Expanding Records. The twenty tracks showcase twenty different synthesizers, one from each year, covering the period 1968-1988. You might expect this deliciously geeky premise to overshadow the music, but Benge has been careful to not get sidetracked by the multitude of knobs and faders. Drones and tones sit comfortably alongside more melodic compositions, culminating in a wonderfully atmospheric album that can be enjoyed from both a musical and technical standpoint.

The CD is presented within a sixty page book containing photos and diagrams of the instruments along with a detailed history documenting the development of synthesisers between 1968 and 1988.


'Presented here are twenty pieces of music created on twenty different synthesisers, one from each year between 1968 and 1988. The purpose of this record is to demonstrate the development of the the synthesiser from the first commercially available systems in the late 1960s to the introduction of fully digital systems in the late 1980s. This is not intended to be a comprehensive history of synthesisers. However, the listener will hopefully gain some insight into the character of each instrument, and on a more general level experience the evolving sound of synthesis over the years. What you hear on each track is the pure sound of an individual instrument. No additional processing, sequencing or effects were applied to any of the recordings. If a system was equipped with an in-built sequencer I made use of it on the particular track, and I often used the process of recording sound-on-sound, where a track is made up of multiple layers of the same synthesiser recorded in parallel. To put it simply, I wanted to let the instruments speak for themselves as much as possible; to let the instruments influence the way I composed the pieces.'
Ben Edwards (Benge)

Tracklisting:
1968 Moog Modular 3C
1969 EMS VCS3
1970 ARP 2500
1971 ARP 2600
1972 Serge Modular
1973 Roland SH2000
1974 Oberheim SEM
1975 Moog Polymoog
1976 Yamaha CS80
1977 Yamaha CS30
1978 Roland 100M
1979 Korg Lambda
1980 Korg Trident
1981 Yamaha CS70M
1982 PPG Wave
1983 Fairlight CMI
1984 Oberheim Xpander
1985 Yamaha CX5M
1986 NED Synclavier
1987 Kawai K5M

myspace.com/twentysystems
expandingrecords.com/releases