Thursday 31 July 2014

SRX - Remastered early, rare and unreleased works from Surgeon

SRX is a 6-volume Surgeon reissues label. 

While searching through old DAT tapes I was shocked to find how clear and dynamic many of my early tracks sounded, not the way I remembered them from the vinyl releases. Those early tracks, recorded 20 years ago, were mastered and cut by people who had no understanding of electronic music. I actually remember cutting a dubplate back then and being asked if my track was "supposed to sound like that?" The engineer was so disgusted at my music that once the cut started he left the room until it was finished.

Although some of these releases have been repressed many times over the years, they have always been from the original plates from those early cuts; none have ever been re-mastered and recut in their original from. So I began carefully transferring everything from the original DAT tapes and working closely with Christoph Grote-Beverborg from Dubplates & Mastering in Berlin (who's been cutting my all my releases since 1996) to present this early material as it was originally intended.

Along with the early Downwards releases, I found high-quality unreleased tracks from that time as well as releases that had only been issued in limited pressings; those too are included in this project. For the packaging I commissioned Ken Meier and Yoonjai Choi from the New York design firm Common Name to create some sumptuous sleeve art. 

SRX001 - Surgeon EP (2014 Remaster)
SRX002 - Pet 2000 (2014 Remaster)
SRX003 - Communications (2014 Remaster)
SRX004 - Dynamic Tension EP (2014 Remaster)
SRX005 - Rare tracks 95-96 (2014 Remaster)
SRX006 - Unreleased tracks 95-96

Monday 14 July 2014

Surgeon (ambient set) Freerotation 2014

This hybrid DJ / Live Set was recorded in a yurt structure at the Freerotation Festival in Wales. This time my idea for the set was to take us all much further out, much deeper inside than the set from last year. A more disembodied experience. 

As I had done last year, I sat on the floor in front of the speakers to perform instead of behind them as a DJ normally does. This greatly enhanced my feeling of experiencing the set with the audience, dissolving the usual performer / audience divide. 
Below is the list of tracks that I played in addition to live improvisation using a eurorack modular system.

Many thanks to Steevio, the whole Freerotation crew and everyone who experienced it there with me.

Lars Von Trier - Intro from Europa
Henry Wolff & Nancy Hennings - Crossing the Line - Tibetan Bells III
Delia Derbyshire - Running - Inventions For Radio - Dreams
Compound Eye - The Hydraulic Regime Vibrates from Within - Journey from Anywhere
Coil - Copal - Moon's Milk (In Four Phases)
Cosey Fanni Tutti - Such Is Life - Time To Tell
Coil - Die Wölfe Kommen Zurück - Black Light District - A Thousand Lights in a Darkened Room
William S. Burroughs - The Cat Inside: Excerpts - The Best Of William Burroughs
Jo Johnson - Words Came After Music - Weaving
Coil - Bism - Worship The Glitch
Delia Derbyshire - Colour - Inventions For Radio - Dreams
Long Distance Poison - Signal I (Drew McDowall Remix) - Gleise Translations
Coil - Caged Birds - Worship The Glitch
Coil - Magnetic North - Winter Solstice
Aphex Twin - Rhubarb - Selected Ambient Works, Volume II
Coil - We Have Always Been Here - Worship The Glitch
Jo Johnson - Long Shadow (Anthony Child remix)
Rapoon - We Danced Like Sticks - The Kirghiz Light
Alessandro Cortini - Resta - Forse 1
Delia Derbyshire - Falling - Inventions For Radio - Dreams
Compound Eye - Open Interval 1 - Journey from Anywhere
Rapoon - Dala - The Kirghiz Light

Coil - Ended - Worship The Glitch