This review is part of a bunch of reviews of older material that we haven't had time to review before but which is still available at the label's mailorder. We apologize for the inconvenience.
The ninth release in the "Material Series" (please read the review of Heimir Bjorgulfsson's record "Machina Natura" in this section to understand what this series is all about and how it is presented to you) is Austrian Pure's "Low". Pure is into video experimentation and even released a self-programmed audio software last year.
His stuff is droning experimental music in the best tradition of Staalplaat. He also released vinyl and 3" Cd and CDs on different labels and has been performing live since 1991.
Even though this is part of the "Material Series", it comes as a full lenght CD. The four very long tracks, whose names all start with the word "Low", have looped low frequency tones, drones and hums as their common denominator and have little and slow changes throughout the recording. What is interesting is that in the fourth Low-piece there are hints of orchestral sounds layered over a sweeping analogue sound.
If you are curios about what material has been used for this release you'll be pleased to know that it's two nice sheets of nice and fine copper gauze. What a great idea!

Scented Meat is Giuseppe Leali, already reviewed as Il Salotto di Nonna Speranza (see archive), bass-player and experimental music agitator with his diy label and distribution Mah, Boh, Oibò?. As the title suggests, these three tracks (coming from 100% improvised guitar and bass solo sessions) are a complement to visual installations by the sculptor Massimo Giuliano and Leali himself. "Altered interference 1" is mainly feedbacks and amps noises with a kind of environmental reverb/delay giving a sense of spatiality; I think it's the best track of the work. "Altered interference 2" is pure feedback hisses in their rawer form. "Not at all" is a bass improvisation, sort of quieter stuff similar to the Nonna Speranza cd. The cd is "voluntarily annoying", and besides that I'd be curious of seeing what kind of visual art it was meant to accompany. Approach only if you like extreme improvised sadomasochism.

Everybody knows experimental musique-concrete band Kimperei, but in this case they rather play a role of supporting musicians for what seems to be a project by Frank Phal, previously with the American band Only A Mother, one of the last surviving "mecanic" musicians, or those extravagant, inventive and creative people who build their own weird instruments and then use them to make records. Just reading the extensive list of instrument's names used in this record is almost worth the record itself: buzzsaw uke, microcontrolled air organ quartet, binary doorbell quintet, washing machine, virtual pet, shrutti box, automatic zithers and many more. While Klimperei add more conventional instruments to the ensemble, call me crazy, but I actually think they added that french touch to the work too... I am not just talking about traditionally romantic instruments, but about the vibe... Nostalgic moods, simple melodies, a very orderly petit chaos and that "a la maison" feel. Titles such as "Snow Eggs", "Ladies Kisses", "Cat's Tongues with Cream", "Almond Rock Cakes", "Espresso Cheescake", "Crepes Suzette" and "Melon Sorbet" complete the picture of this random caprices, avantgarde bricolage, appetizing experimentalism and romantic voyerism... Keep room for dessert!

72, 80, 53, 28: these are the figures; respectively minutes, fragments, tracks and artists. Monia De Laurentis, one of the ever-busy key characters of Italy's underground noise scene has been leading her cool small-print-no-spacing-diy-'zine Itself for years and has now apparently decided to put out a CD compilation and call it after her publication, plus some other unpronounceable words. I don't know any of the bands but in case you do here's the list: The Saboten, Yuko Nexus, Ex Girl, Acid Mothers Temple & the Melting Paraiso U.F.O., Aki Onda, Astro, Calculated, Love Furniture Lounge Bears, Gaji, Sakamoto Hiromiti, Thermo, Tipographica, Yoshio Machida, Sawai Kazue, Hadiot, Kangaroo Paw, Matsumoto Tadashi, Thermo, Pugs, Animo Computer, Hoppy Kamiyama, Phnonpenh Model, Kirihito, Aki Onda, Cherry & Co., Kazutoki Umezu, Droptone, Freak from Ocean, Lion Merry. Obviously most of these folks are asian and another thing they all have in common is that they play some crazy-ass freaky noise cut-ups mixing fusion, free-jazz, muzak, no-wave, musique-concrete, avantgarde, experimental, bricolant, exotic and other uncured insanity. If you are into any or all of the above this gotta be right up your alley. Addresses included.

Not sure this is actually suitable content for a publication like ours but we'll do an exception because it's a label that usually does different stuff... Not that I dislike it, on the contrary, I dig this stuff a lot personally, but we have made a commitment to our readers to be as true as possible to our initial goal to give exposure to electronic/industrial music and the like... So please, labels out there, take a note and remember we don't review jazz/rock/blues/metal etc... Anyway back to what is important in the end: the music. We hope that readers, the band and the label will excuse if we have used a couple of lines of this space to clarify our goals and guidelines, once again.
So, first off, Moulder and Scully don't have anything to do with this. Brand X is an american combo (I belive they're New Yorkers) with incredibly talented musicians who's been performing a mixture of progressive rock and free-jazz with occasional sprinkles of funk for at least two decades. Almost no vocals (except for guests) these two gifted cats, John Goodsall (guitar) and Percy Jones (bass), supported by a number of likewise hot musicians, basically plays fusion in its maybe truest form. Think Uzeb, Jetro Tall, Earth Wind and Fire, Japan, Gong, Weather Report, Genesis, Pat Metheny and other prog-rock/art/fusion/jazz bands out there...
"The X Files" is a double CD "best of" that collects tracks spanning between 1976 and 1999, including studio out takes, live versions (NYC and Japan Tour), remastered stuff, previously unreleased tracks etc. Special guests include Bayete, Malcom Bruce, Bill Bruford, Mike Clarke, Phil Collins from Genesis (singing through a really crappy mic), John Giblin, Frank Katz, Robin Lumley, Pierre Moerlen (Gong), Morris Pert, Chester Thompson, Danny Wilding and at least a half dozen others.
Considering our audience's tastes not too many will probably run to a store to get this, which is too bad 'cause its a good collection of tracks (both for who simply loves good music and for those crazy about virtuoso, as there is some really dope playing, especially guitar solos and bass fingering...) and according to the band: "this is a much more accurate representation of our work over the past 20 years than anything else that is out there".